OLD VERSION: High School Never Ends
by Eliss Elusive
Summary: Please don't read this if you haven't already.
1. Let the Games Begin

**Chapter One  
****Let the Games Begin**

Guidance counseling at Shallow Lake High was a big fat joke.

When you found yourself stuck in that small room of death known as the counselor's office, it was usually for one of three reasons. I've been there enough; I should know.

The arguably most pleasantly horrible scenario is taking personality tests. You know, those dumb ones that ask you if you like reading to deaf children, walking dogs, volunteering, or maybe just spending your entire summer feeding homeless children in Peru – stuff no teenager actually does. The guidance counselor forced me to do one once so he could get some _deep insight_ into my _true personality_. I doubt he really cared. It's probably another one of those things the state forces staff to do, just like serving healthy food.

The second usually closely follows the first. It's going over the results of your personality test. This is immeasurably worse than the first, because it involves some interaction with the guidance counselor. I doubt that he even wants this job. The only reason he got it is because his dad is the principal.

He told me that my tests indicated I would be best suited to something that involved little emotional attachment and required a low IQ. I could have told him that without taking a test that took nearly three hours. He recommended a job at McDonald's. I recommended he do a better job of hiding the fact that he was hung over.

Now I suppose you want to hear the third reason - the reason I was currently in the room of death.

Let me just start by saying that Kelsey Forester started it. She may have ended up with a few broken bones, but it's nothing she didn't have coming. I refuse to say more until a lawyer is present.

But apparently the disciple committee didn't care, because it was me sitting in the small room of death, and Kelsey was probably either at her fifth hour class – or the hospital.

The guidance counselor was in charge of all discipline referrals. Usually you talked for a few minutes about how what you did was wrong and you should never do it again, and then you got a detention. You got three discipline referrals and you were out – literally. I don't mean you got expelled – you had to do serious shit to get kicked out of a public school – but you did get suspended for at least a few days.

Yet for some reason, I was still in the hellhole known as the guidance office, and I had a suspicion my punishment wasn't going to be as simple as a few days off of school.

The guidance counselor sighed and sipped something from his mug. Judging by the smell that was permeating the room, I deduced it was a little stronger than coffee. "This is the third time you've had a discipline referral, Lucas."

"Really? You know I can count. And it's Luke."

"Being a wise-ass isn't going to help."

"Oh, and you're going to?" The way I figured, there wasn't anything worse they could do to me, short of making my suspension longer. And really, was that such a bad thing?

He cleared his throat. Cue a long speech that he didn't want to give and I sure as hell didn't want to hear. It was time to resort to my tried and true method of tuning him out: find a poster on the wall and stare at it.

It was one of those abstinence ones, something about how if you kiss a frog, he is still just a frog. I had no clue how that related to abstinence. Maybe it meant if you have sex with a guy, he would still be a guy when you woke up the next morning. But still, if you didn't know that...well then you needed more help than the guidance counselor could give you.

"...and then the hooker took off the jacket and I saw her giant – oh good, I figured that would get your attention."

The temptation to make a snide remark was overwhelming, but I had a feeling something important was coming.

"Listen, Lucas. I know your attention span is short, so I'll keep this quick. Instead of suspension, you've been given an alternative," droned Mr. Raging Alcoholic. "There's a new student, a freshman named Peter Johnson, starting next week. It'll be your job to be his 'big brother.'"

"That's an alternative, right? Because I'll take the suspen-" I started to protest. I'd never been a big brother to anyone, nor did I want to find out what it was like.

The guidance counselor interrupted me. "No."

"But you said-"

"I lied. Tried to make it sound a little nicer, like you had some choice in the matter. But this is a good opportunity." The tone of his voice showed that he thought otherwise. "You show Peter around, help him make friends, and keep him out of trouble."

"And if I don't?"

Apparently I wasn't supposed to say that. The guidance counselor's face turned red, even more than normal. "Then you're expelled. If Peter gets in to any trouble, you're responsible."

I folded my arms and gave him the look of death. I've been told I'm quite good at it – at least, my mom usually gave in when I used it on her.

"Try it on someone who cares, Lucas. The new kid shows up tomorrow. Be welcoming or get expelled," the counselor said. "Now leave."

God, the discipline system at Shallow Lake High was a big fat joke.

* * *

Annabeth Chase: synonymous for overachieving perfectionist, class president, and girl who would go places one day.

Giant ego? Not me. My friends would definitely tell me if being so successful was going to my head. That is, if I had friends. But whatever. You can't have everything.

Okay, sometimes I was lonely. Big deal. It was a phase. As soon as I got out of this small town and went to a big college, I'd make plenty of friends.

Shallow Lake had a population that had never topped a thousand, including livestock back in the days when all the families farmed. Everyone knew everything about everyone. Sometimes it was painful, but other times it was surprisingly convenient.

Like in sixth period geometry.

"Kelsey Forester has a concussion and a dislocated shoulder," Lea, the class diva, stage whispered to Jeff. Everyone in the entire room was able to hear her. "I don't know what she said to make Luke mad, but he was pissed."

Sad but true – my attention was piqued at the mention of the school's bad boy. In my defense, every girl in Shallow Lake had at least a small crush on him.

Becky, my biggest competition for valedictorian, turned around to face Lea. "She said he was a stuck up bastard who thought he was too good for everyone here," she said in her annoying nasal voice.

"Actually, they've been having a secret love affair, and Luke called it off. Kelsey attacked him and everything he did was in self-defense," Kasey chimed in. She was Kelsey's sister, so one would assume she'd have the story to trust. Unfortunately, she was also the star of the drama program and had a knack for making things more theatrical than they were.

"Class!" Ms. Wesley shouted. "Pay attention!"

We all pretended to listen about parallel lines and transversals for, oh, three seconds. Then it was back to gossiping.

"This is his third referral. You know what that means," Lea continued, leaning towards Jeff so he had a good view of her cleavage.

"We're not going to have anything nice to stare at until he's done with his suspension," Megan, the girl sitting next to me, sighed.

"That's it! I'm doubling the homework assignment," Ms. Wesley shrieked.

Great. That'd be no problem.

If only I'd been listening to anything she'd said.


	2. It's a Small World After All

**Chapter Two  
****It's a Small World After All**

You wanna know how I ended up in Shallow Lake?

Well, it started with being kicked out of every school in the tri-state area.

Now before you go pegging me as some crazy juvie who likes to blow stuff up, just know that there were only three, and one had been a hippy school. Yeah, like a school where you sat on beanbags and talked about how lava lamps were a metaphor for life.

After the last one kicked me out, I figured I'd get sent to some school in North Dakota or Louisiana next. That's when Mom pulled a fast one on me.

"How would you feel about going to public school?" she asked after I broke the news to her. My mom thought cell phones were linked to brain cancer and food that wasn't organic was soaked in pesticide. Sending her only kid to a public school was one of her worst nightmares.

Of course I told her I would. She confessed that she really missed me and thought Shallow Lake was a pretty good town. I'd never been there longer than a few weeks at a time for school breaks. All I knew was that it was a small town with a school, convenience store, and not much else.

We'd ended up in Shallow Lake by what can only be described as a gold digger move on my mom's part.

A few years ago we were living in New York. I went to some fancy alternative school and Mom waitressed at a café while she tried to take college courses. Money was obviously pretty tight.

One day a bunch of guys strolled into the café while my mom was working. She later learned that they were there in New York for some big business convention. Anyway, they were nice enough, or so she thought.

I really wish the story ended there. Unfortunately, one of the guys kept coming every day. By then my mom was able to conclude three things: he was a huge slob, was made of money, and had a huge crush on her. All she did was encourage him a little bit, and in three weeks…bam! They were getting married.

At least, that's how the story goes in my head.

Gabe Ugliano owned the aforementioned sole convenience store in Shallow Lake, Michigan. His great grandfather had founded it or something, and it just fell to him by default. A guy like Smelly Gabe, as I liked to call him, would never have had the brains to start something like that.

Mom knew I hated him. After a few weeks of living together with more than a few disagreements, she saw that things were never going to work out. She had to take a side, so instead of kicking Smelly Gabe to the curb, I got shipped off to boarding school.

She obviously couldn't put up with him anymore, so she wanted me back to help lessen the burden known as Smelly Gabe. I wished she would just break up with the guy, but he was paying for her online classes, and all she had to do was pretend to love him.

Unless, you know, she actually loved him.

No, that couldn't be true. Gabe Ugliano was physically impossible to love. He was a big ungrateful pig who thought he was the master of the universe.

And I was stuck living with him.

The first day of school was always terrible. I knew that. The new kid was the center of attention for a few hours, next rumors started circulating about them, and then they spent a variable amount of time being a loner before finding a place to fit in before the next move.

I'd done it at least 12 times. I was a self-proclaimed expert. One day I'd write a book about it.

The school itself was incredibly small. I had no problem finding my locker. However, I did not expect to find a guy standing next to it, almost like he was waiting for me. Tall, blonde, and tan – he looked like he'd stepped straight out of a Hollister photo shoot. Obviously, he wasn't a freshman.

Then I wondered why someone who was obviously not a freshman was standing next to the lockers assigned to the freshmen. Maybe he had some underclassman girlfriend whose locker was right next to mine. Yeah, that was probably it.

Sighing, I went to go open my lock. 10-25-10…or was it 25-10-25? Great, I'd already forgotten my combination. At least there hadn't been lockers at the hippie school. There also hadn't been any deodorant.

Might as well start trying now, I thought. Maybe I'd be ready for my first hour English class. Dropping my heavy backpack to the ground, I started plugging in numbers.

"Are you Peter Johnson?"

I could have jumped. It was the older kid…talking to me. "No, not me," I mumbled, focusing on the lock. I stopped at the last number and pulled. No luck.

"New kid?" he tried again, sounding irritated.

"Yeah, but my name's not Peter. I'm-"

"Don't know. Don't care. Listen, I'm assigned to you." I looked out of the corner of my eye at him. He had this look in his eyes…like he was the kind of guy who would start a house on fire just to watch it burn. "I have to show you around today and help you fit in. After that, stay out of trouble and we never have to see each other again."

I tried one more combination before looking up. "Um, okay. Sure."

He figured me out in all of two seconds. "You already forgot your locker combination." It wasn't even a question.

I shook my head and he shoved me over. "Move." He spun the lock around a few times, and it clicked open. "20-15-20. Try not to forget this time."

"Um, thanks." I was too intimidated to ask how he knew my combination, or more importantly, realize a guy like him knowing my combination probably wasn't a good thing.

He tapped his foot impatiently while I started putting all my binders in my locker. As a freshman, you took pretty much the same courses at any school. The only electives I'd gotten to pick were tech ed and some ag class.

"Underwood!" the guy shouted. I looked over my shoulder. A nerdy kid with a mop of curly hair stopped and looked in our direction. His eyes widened in disbelief – or maybe fear. "Yeah, talking to you. Get over here."

He came over in a walk that was more of a lopsided gallop than anything. "You want a new friend? Of course you do. Show the new kid around the school for me."

"I, uh, umm…" he stuttered.

The upperclassman ignored him. "Okay, Peter. If a fat balding guy asks you how your first day is going, say Luke gave you a very nice tour and helped you make some friends," he said slowly, like he was talking to a little kid. "Understand?"

I gulped and nodded. Luke took off, leaving me with some other stranger. I was starting to feel like a cargo sack tossed from one person to the next.

"Um, I'm Grover," the guy said, running a hand through his mop of curly hair. He had a bad case of acne and stood kind of hunched over. "So…do you have English or government first hour?"

"English."

Grover's face lit up. "Me too. It's on the second floor. I can…umm…show you where everything is on the way up there."

I'll admit it. I kind of didn't want to be seen with Grover. It was obvious that he wasn't the most popular kid, and I really didn't want to be branded an outcast on the first day at my new school. "That's okay. I'm sure I can find it."

"Oh, well…okay." He didn't do a good job hiding his disappointment. "I guess I'll see you around then."

Our class didn't have more than 50 kids. I'm sure he would.


	3. Opportunity Knocks

**Chapter Three  
****Opportunity Knocks**

If I didn't have bad luck, I wouldn't have any luck at all.

I'd say it started when I was born and my parents decided to name me Grover Harrison Underwood. Glenn always argued that he had it worse, especially after Mean Girls came out.

I had six older siblings. Greta, the eldest, was thirty, on her second marriage, and had six kids. I guess you could say having a huge family was kind of a tradition.

Another unfortunate thing about my parents: they were goat farmers. Yes, goats. Apparently everyone had been goat farmers when Shallow Lake was first founded, or so my parents told me. What they left out was while everyone had either given up on farming or at least moved on to something respectable (cows, pigs, sheep…), my great grandparents stayed with tradition. Now it was the Underwood legacy or something, and one day I was going to have to be a goat farmer.

Yeah, story of my life.

I played the oboe – just another reason I was mocked endlessly. You see, in 7th grade I had the choice of band or art. I had no artistic talent whatsoever, so I chose what seemed the lesser of two evils. I wanted to play something cool, like trumpet. My parents had other ideas.

We didn't have a lot of money. Being the youngest, I was used to getting hand-me-downs. Still, I expected to at least be entitled to my own instrument. Dad just rolled his eyes. He'd spent more than a few thousand dollars on an oboe that Gladys had only played for three years. If I wanted to be in band, I was predestined for the double reed section.

Oboe really wasn't that bad of an instrument. It just had a terrible record for sounding ducky; I blame _Peter and the Wolf_. Anyway, I was pretty good. I even had a solo in our next concert.

That was why I'd stayed late after school – to work with the band instructor on it. I was surprised Mr. Sol had the time to help me; positions had been cut last year and he was now the school's sole art, band, and choir instructor.

After I finished the last few bars, I looked to Mr. Sol for approval. "You know," he stroked his chin thoughtfully. "You have a really good ear for pitch."

"Umm…thanks?" I bleated nervously.

"How about going out for jazz choir? We need another tenor." When I didn't answer right away, he started his sales pitch. I got the feeling he'd given it to more than a few kids. "We practice three times a week before school, and I know you guys are supposed to be all jazzy and shit, but you can pretty much sing whatever."

I still didn't answer. First off, I'd never even tried to sing. And secondly, jazz choir, just like playing oboe, was synonymous for social suicide.

Mr. Sol seemed to know what was on my mind. "Hey, this year some really talented people went out. Carrie Frieder, Josh Hendrickson, Silena Beuregaurd…" Apparently by talented, he meant popular.

That changed things. My mind instantly came up with this fantasy. I'd be lead tenor. All the popular kids would realize how great I really was, and I'd be able to make it through the rest of high school without being a complete loser. Wait, I was getting ahead of myself.

"Umm…I'll think about it, okay?"

"Sure. Next practice is Monday, 7:00."

* * *

Has anyone ever managed to make you feel like the stupidest person in the planet with just one word? Yeah, I didn't think it was possible either. But then again, in all of the twelve schools I'd been to, I'd never met anyone like Annabeth Chase.

We'd been put in groups to discuss the book we were reading for English: To Kill a Mockingbird. Apparently there was an immense amount of foreshadowing in the first 20 pages. All I saw was a bratty little girl who was obsessed with a creepy hermit.

Annabeth just kept looking at me with her creepy gray eyes, like she was waiting for me to say something. So I did. "Well, I think the book can only get better after someone gets stabbed with scissors."

She gave me the look of death. "No."

I wanted to ask her what her problem was. All I'd done was say one sentence. And seriously, this was school. Who really cared about racism in the 1930s and a guy named Abacus?

Every other group was just chatting away, but not us. Annabeth seemed perfectly fine to just sit there and ignore me. Well, I had a short attention span. "If you're so smart, what do you think's gonna happen?"

She rolled her eyes. "A white girl forces herself on a black man; her father catches them and says the aforementioned black man raped his daughter. Atticus is appointed to defend him, but the guy still ends up dying. Then the father-"

"How can you make all this up?" I asked, stunned.

"I read it when I was six," she informed me. "And since then, I've read it five more times. It's one of the best books of the 20th century."

I bet she even edited Wikipedia in her free time.

Was it too late to go back to boarding school?

* * *

I didn't usually make out with girls on my couch after school, but when a cute senior more or less threw herself at me, I wasn't about to say no.

"You wanna buy some cookies?" the girl at the door said. She was wearing her Girl Scout uniform, and let's just say it was more than a few sizes too small. She smacked her lips. "Oh. Luke. You live here."

Like she hadn't known.

"Depends. Can I try some first?"

She shrugged and batted her eyelashes. "That's kind of against the rules."

"I'm not telling if you don't."

She raised an eyebrow. "Fine. You gonna let me in?"

I opened the door wider. "You know I wasn't talking about cookies, right?"

She looked at me just long enough to roll her eyes. "You think I'm that stupid?"

I figured she was worth my time. And that's how I ended up making out with a cute senior on my couch, whose name I didn't know or care to learn. My mom would have flipped. Good thing she was working late.

"You're more fun than I expected," she whispered in my ear. "Do this a lot?"

I wished she would just shut up. "All the time."

"Sure." She stretched the word out into at least four syllables. "You know, you've always seemed like kind of a loner since-"

The doorbell rang. Shit. Mom was home early.

"Back door," I hissed. She nodded, her eyes wide as she straightened her vest.

A very tiny part of me was thankful the doorbell had rang, I guess. I knew where the conversation had been headed, and things would not have ended very nicely.

But when I opened the door, it was just an average UPS guy. "Package for you," he said, handing over a medium-sized box.

"Thanks." Now was the time that he was supposed to leave, but this guy just kept looking at me. "What?" I finally asked.

"You have a hickey on your neck."

"Do not."

"Oh yeah? Then what is it?"

"Mosquito bite."

"World's largest mosquito." A grin spread across his face. It made him look way too familiar, but I couldn't place where I'd seen him before.

"Don't you have other stuff to deliver?"

"I suppose I do." And just like that, he walked down our sidewalk, got into his car, and drove off.

I dropped the box by the door, ignoring the large fragile sticker on it. It was for Mom anyway. I had more important things to worry about.

Like how to get rid of a hickey.


	4. Amazing Grace

**Chapter Four  
****Amazing Grace**

_My grandmother wasn't Christian. She wasn't a shining beacon of compassion and faith. The nicest thing she'd ever said to me was, "Thalia, the only good thing about seeing you is I appreciate the quiet so much more once you're gone."_

_Death was the most flattering cloak a person could wear._

_The church was stifling. My mom kept mopping her face with a kerchief, but it was pointless. Leave it to Grandma Adrienne to make us suffer even after she was long gone._

_"I think I can smell rotting flesh," I moaned to my mom. In reality, all I could smell was incense. "When can we go home?"_

_She pursed her lips. "If you're going to act like a child, you can wait outside."_

_Yes, please._

_I plowed through the assorted family members in our pew, mumbling excuses about feeling sick and needing fresh air. My dress was sticking to my legs. Damn Grandma Adrienne._

_As morbid as it sounded, death was a big deal in Shallow Lake. It meant the whole town got to go to the funeral home and pretend to care, and afterwards they got a free meal out of it. Or at least that's how I saw things._

_Mom always said I was too dark for my own good._

_And worst of all, when the population was only a few thousand, everyone knew everyone. When Adrienne died, people knew the entire Grace clan, spread out all over the country, would come to pay their last respects._

_When you unexpectedly left two weeks before freshman year started, your former friends were bound to show up just to ask you where the hell you'd been for nearly two years. So far I'd only seen a handful of people, all of whom I was able to dodge before the service started._

_But of course the one person I feared confronting most would be waiting for me._

_He was sitting next to the small flower garden on one of the oversized rocks. A lit cigarette dangled from his mouth. Besides that little detail, he looked exactly like I remembered him. His sandy hair was in desperate need of a trim, his jeans holy, and the Hollister shirt he was wearing was faded to the point where it was almost white._

_"So it took your old hag of a grandmother dying for you to come back," Luke said, blowing out a big cloud of smoke. The whole thing reminded me of the scene in Alice in Wonderland with the caterpillar._

_I wished I could have acted half as composed as him. A pregnant pause hung between us before I blurted, "When'd you start smoking?"_

_"When'd you grow up?" he shot back._

_When you were gone. Neither of us said anything. I didn't know what I'd imagined for the moment when we saw each other again, but this was not it._

_"You should sit down," he finally said, moving over on his rock to make room for me._

_I put a hand on my hip. "What makes you think I'm staying out here with you?"_

_"Because you don't care about the heavenly words of the Lord or whatever, and you can't stand the people who pretend they do. No one in this town is actually Christian. They all just pretend to be, because they're scared they'll be kicked out of the little small town circle if people know they're not."_

_I couldn't deny that he'd hit the nail right on the head. Feigning reluctance, I sat next to him._

_"Why'd you leave?" Luke asked, his blue eyes fixed on me._

_"Not much for small talk, I see."_

_He rolled his eyes. "Fine. How's your mom?" _

_Just like that, we went from one bad subject to another. In reality, my mom was the reason we left. I came home one day and everything was packed. She told me she was moving to California. I could come with her or stay with my grandparents._

_Once we got settled in California, she tried to get back into acting, something she'd had to give up when she got pregnant with me. However, no one wanted her. Who cared if she'd been on Days of Our Lives for three weeks? No one even remembered Samantha Clandestine._

_She took the rejection hard. I just tried to stay out of her way as much as possible._

_Then I came home one day and our stuff was packed again. For a second I thought we were moving permanently back to Michigan. "Adrienne died. We have to go back for the funeral. It will only be a few days; I promise," Mom informed me, no emotion in her voice whatsoever._

_And that was how we ended up here._

_I remembered he'd asked me a question. "Just great. Could you put that out? It's gross."_

_He sighed and put out his cigarette on the rock, then tossed it in the garden. Of course he wouldn't have any reverence for the house of the Lord. I didn't either. "Your mom know you're smoking now?"_

_"Do you really care?"_

_Again, it was back to silence. I suddenly missed the days when we were little kids and could talk for hours about nothing. "I don't know why we left," I finally offered._

_"Well that makes two of us."_

_"My mom told me we couldn't talk to anyone back home." My defense sounded weak, even to me. "She said we were in trouble and needed to stay under the radar for a while, or…"_

_"Since when do you listen to your mom? How hard would it be to pick up the phone just once and-"_

_"I didn't think that it would matter. And maybe it was just better to forget about everything. We were only little kids, and-"_

_"So nothing mattered to you? We were best friends, and you could just leave?"_

_"It doesn't matter. We're flying out tonight."_

_The next few seconds seemed to happen in slow motion. Luke leaned closer to me, his face only inches from mine. It was a rare moment when he let his guard down. "I missed you," he whispered. _

_That was all it took for me to make the decision I'd probably regret for the rest of my life. I pulled him close, my mouth meeting his. _

_"You taste like cherries," he whispered, licking his lips. I could feel his hot breath on my neck and his warm hands wandering down to uncharted land. Well, he wasn't one for wasting time._

_"Luke," I hissed. "We're in front of a church." Judging by how we was, well, feeling, I didn't think he would have cared if we were in the middle of Times Square._

_He gave me an innocent look. "There's an upstairs."_

_My freshman health teacher told me that unless you planned ahead, your teenage emotions would win every time. Well, I never really planned on losing my virginity to my childhood best friend in the upper story of a church while my grandmother's funeral was going on downstairs._

_Hormones: one. Thalia: zero._

* * *

_Did the doorknob just jiggle? I froze, and Thalia looked at me, her eyes wide. "Get dressed," I whispered. "Fast."_

_I thanked the nonexistent god - whose church I'd just defiled - that I'd remembered to lock the door. "You ready?" I looked at her after I had my clothes back on._

_She nodded, running a hand through her unruly hair. "I'll follow your lead."_

_Yeah, leave me to get us out of this mess. I unlocked the door and plastered a fake smile on my face. "Reverend Candra! Is the service done already?"_

_Reverend Candra looked like she couldn't be older than twelve, yet she'd been at the church since I was a little kid. She also had a low bullshit tolerance, so I was going to have to be pretty careful to get out of this. "No, but we need some more incense."_

_Incense. Right. "Yeah, well, we're up here because Thalia was feeling a little sick, and you know, it's so hot outside, and…"_

_The reverend was not buying it. We were screwed. Okay, bad choice of words._

_I heard little sobs from behind me. "It's just…Grandma Adrienne was so nice…and it's so sad that she's gone, and I couldn't handle going back in to watch the rest of the service…" Thalia put her head in her hands and continued crying._

_"Oh, well…" Thalia's outburst left the reverend started and obviously uncomfortable. "I'm going to grab the incense, and you can stay up here as long as you need to, Miss Grace. Remember, she is with the Lord, and she will always be watching over you."_

_I could barely keep from laughing until Reverend Candra left. "It's not funny," Thalia said, punching me in the arm. Hard. She wiped the fake tears off her face. "She knew why we were up here."_

_"Oh yeah? How?"_

_"Luke. Look at your pants."_

_My face turned red. "Yeah, well…good thing you could come in with the fake tears."_

_"My mom's an actress," she said by way of explanation. "Even if her career was a complete failure, you learn a few things over the years."_

_We could smell the incense wafting up from downstairs and hear a pipe organ belt out the beginning chords of Amazing Grace. "Oh my God," Thalia said. "My grandma is having her funeral downstairs, and we just had sex."_

_I shrugged. "You really don't care?" she demanded._

_"Yeah, I care…but, I don't get why you're freaking out."_

_"We see each other for the first time in two years and you decide that it's a great idea to go have sex on top of a church. We're probably doomed to go to hell or some shit. How are you not freaking out?"_

_"Well it's a good thing you can go home in a few hours and forget this ever happened."_

_She fixed me with a glare and headed for the door. "I'm crazy for thinking you might have changed over two years."_

_"What's that supposed to mean?"_

_"Don't pretend you don't know when you do it to every single person in your life. Everything's fine as long as you get what you want. But the second someone turns to you wanting something, you just push them away."_

_"Is this because I don't have a problem with having sex in a church?"_

_"Quit dodging!" She was a few decibels away from screaming. "I'm stupid, so stupid. You know what? I'm just gonna go back down and watch the rest of my grandma's service. And you can just go wherever, as long as it's not anywhere near me. Let's forget this ever happened. Even better, let's pretend we never knew each other!"_

_She stormed out the door, and I just watched her go._

I ran a hand through my hair and bit my lip. Going back once was hard enough.

Going back twice was going to be impossible.

Especially knowing this time, there was no flight back to California waiting for me.


	5. Wake Up Call

**Chapter Five  
****Wake Up Call**

I was so stupid.

The last time I sang was in my preschool Christmas program. So what if I could make my oboe crow at a perfect C pitch? Mr. Sol had no idea what he was talking about. Me in jazz choir would be like a jock on the chess team.

And that's why I'd showed up. Yeah, it didn't make any sense. I hadn't even told my parents that's why I needed to be dropped off at school early. Dad believed me when I told him I had a tech ed project that needed to be finished.

So here I was, standing in the doorway with ten or so people all staring at me.

"This is who you found, Mr. Sol? Really?" Becky Nakamura groaned. "He's not even in regular choir."

Kasey Forester rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Now we have 15 people. That's enough to compete in the music festival."

I took a few tentative steps in the door. "Umm…" Very eloquent, I know.

"You can sit next to me," Silena Beuregaurd said brightly. She was wearing bright pink sweats and a state volleyball shirt. "Well, for today."

Lightning could have struck me dead at that moment and I wouldn't have been any more surprised. I dropped my backpack in the pile that had amassed by the door and took the empty seat next to her.

"Anyway, as we were saying…" Bianca di Angelo cleared her throat. I really didn't know her; she was one of the seniors, and from what I saw, she wasn't very nice to anyone besides her brother. "We have to sing the Star Spangled Banner for the Veterans Day program. Then there's the Christmas program, and I swear if we sing Jingle Bell Rock again, I will go home and kill myself."

I couldn't tell if she was kidding or not.

Mr. Sol stepped in. I hadn't even noticed him sitting at the front of the room. "I think what Bianca is trying to say is, we need to figure out what you guys are going to sing for Christmas."

"I hate Christmas music," Jeff Salvator grumbled. A few people muttered in agreement.

Everyone was silent for a few minutes, besides the assorted conversations between a few people. "Well, looks like you guys are singing Jingle Bell Rock again," Mr. Sol said. "That is, if no one has any better ideas." I swear he gave me a look right then. Really? First he assumed I could sing, and now I was the walking iPod?

"The Nightmare Before Christmas," Silena piped in. "It's Christmassy in a way, but not all virgin mother and child."

"I am the clown with the tear away face," Josh Hendrickson boomed in a deep baritone. Carrie Friender laughed next to him.

"It'd be perfect," Silena kept going. "The guys could sing What's This, the girls could sing Sally's Song, and then we could all sing Making Christmas." Her eyes lit up. "It'd be so perfect. We could do our makeup all fancy and look amazing."

Bianca sighed. "It's better than last year. But just barely." I was picking up on a diva attitude.

"Okay, well, you guys are free to go. I'll start looking for music," Mr. Sol said. "Remember, next practice is Wednesday. We have to run through the Star Spangled Banner a few times."

A few people groaned. Others got up, grabbed their backpacks, and headed for their lockers. Silena took her time, slowly uncrossing her legs and standing up.

"Good idea," I said. The words almost caught in my throat.

She smacked her lips and faced me. "Okay, listen. We give every new member this talk, and it just so happens to be my turn to dish it out. We're nice to each other during jazz choir. You might even say we _like_ each other during jazz choir. But when we walk out of the music room, that's all gone. You're just a freshman loser, and you don't ever dare talk to me. Understand?"

Well, then.

"Yeah. Understood."

So much for the popularity dream.

* * *

This was my chance. I could do this. All I had to do was walk up to him and start talking. Then everything would just flow from there.

I was pretty sure he even remembered me. One day when I was walking down the hall, he'd looked at me for a second longer than socially necessary. If I had any friends to gush about it to, they'd probably say I was being over analytical.

Too bad I didn't have any friends.

We had a break in between third and fourth hour. It was only fifteen minutes – not really long enough to do anything, but it was the only chance I had to talk to him.

He was trying to find something in his locker. I was pretty sure there was a hickey on his neck. What if she was home and he had already hooked up with her? Then I'd seem like the dumb little kid who was the last one to know everything – like I'd always been when we were younger.

_Here goes nothing_, I thought, walking up to his locker. "Hey, Luke."

He looked down at me. "Oh. Hey…Annabeth."

My heart sank. He didn't remember my name. "Did you see…in the paper…Thalia's mom died last week," I stuttered, suddenly nervous even though I'd rehearsed this.

"Oh, wow. That sucks."

Was that…sarcasm? No, I was just reading too far in to things. "You think she'll come back?"

"Don't know. Don't wanna know. Can't say I really care."

I tried to keep my jaw from dropping. Thalia and Luke had always gone together like sine and cosine. "Oh, well…ummm…" I couldn't think of what to say.

He gave me a bored look. I tried not to take it personally. "She's just like her mom – a first-class bitch."

Again, speechless. I was so stupid. This hadn't even made the list of 50 different outcomes I'd made in my head. OCD? Not even close.

Luke's face softened. "You okay?"

"Yeah. I mean, yes. Wait, no. It'll just be so weird if she comes back. And what are we supposed to say? 'Hey, sorry your mom died.' She hated her mom…" I decided it was well past time to shut up.

"I know you look up to her and everything, but don't get your hopes up. She's different now," he said, sounding slightly bitter. "Just remember that, okay?"

"Yeah," I choked out. He was looking at me so intensely with those gorgeous blue eyes that I thought I might melt.

He smiled. Oh. My. God. He smiled. "See you around, Annabeth."

* * *

"You can have Charlotte's old room," Nell said quietly. "And…Thalia…the extra boxes…"

"My mom's things," I snapped.

"Your mom's things can go in her old room. We can go through them one day when…"

"Yeah. Whatever. I'll grab my stuff."

Before I go on, let me give you the crash course on the Grace family.

We were one of the first families in Shallow Lake. Hell, we might even have been here before Shallow Lake was established.

See, Thomas and Caroline Grace rounded up a bunch of horses from the west, moved to Shallow Lake, and made a fortune breeding and selling their stallions and mares. Bringing the fire of the South to the Midwest, as the slogan goes. Their original house was still on the property – now renovated and used strictly as a guest residence.

Now the horses made good money, but that wasn't how my family became as affluent as we are today. My great-grandfather had decided to test his luck and do some investing in the stock market. In just a few short weeks, my family went from being wealthy to completely loaded.

Richard Grace decided there was no need to keep the horses around commercially. He sold all except a few, built the giant manor we live in today, and wisely distributed the money between stocks and the bank so future generations of Graces would never have to work a day in their lives.

Charles, being the eldest in his generation, got everything: the wealth, the house, the cocky arrogance that goes along with having everything in your life handed to you. He married Adrienne when they were both 18. She was a rich little heiress – I think that's what helped Charles overlook her many, well, imperfections.

Charlotte was born two years later. Three years after that, they had Mary. And two years after Mary came my mom, Diana. Now Penelope is the funny part. When my mom was 15, Adrienne got pregnant again. How it happened, I will never know. Charles was excited – he might actually get his son. But no, it was just another damn girl. His words, not mine.

Adrienne was never happy with anything her kids did. Charlotte married a rich doctor and had four kids. Well, she could have at least gone to college. It's no longer decent for a woman to just sit around and raise children. Mary graduated top of her class and got her master's degree in nuclear science. It's not wise for a girl to be that smart. She'll never find a decent husband.

Now, Diana almost had Adrienne satisfied. At the young age of 21, she'd managed to get a recurring role on Days of Our Lives. She was getting calls left and right from directors, offering her the leading role in their next movie.

Things were great, until she came home for that year's Christmas party. After a few too many fruity drinks, she started saying things about the cast and producers of the show that had made her so famous. A few guests, eager to make some quick money, sold the story to every magazine that would listen.

That's when it came time for Samantha Clandestine to die in a car accident. It would become prophetic in the years to come, but at the moment, it was nothing more than a young woman throwing away her life.

Oh, and there'd been a little more going on at that Christmas party than just badmouthing. That's right, just three weeks after being axed, Diana found out she was pregnant.

The tabloids were interested in her for about a month. Then some new star became infamous and they my mom was nothing more than yesterday's news. _People_ did a little article when I was born, but that was it.

We stuck around in California for a while, my mom working odd jobs while taking online classes to get a degree in nursing. We moved around a lot, pretty much living with whoever my mom's boyfriend was at the time. I didn't remember a lot of it; thank God.

I wished Mom would have just asked Adrienne for money. Adrienne wasn't going to offer anything to the daughter who'd disgraced her the most, and Mom wasn't the kind of person who asked for help. Whatever. We lived through it.

Mom was dating this guy, and they'd been together for three years. I can't say he was that bad – we'd lived with worse. Mom had finished up her degree and was working at a little hospital. She wished she could still be the star she once was, but maybe, just maybe, she'd finally given up on the dream.

Then the shit hit the fan. Mom's boyfriend caught her in bed with another guy – some up-and-coming director who hadn't found a leading lady for his movie. We were kicked out of the house before mom could throw her clothes back on – literally.

Mom was defeated. I think she'd really hoped to marry this boyfriend, and the other guy had been a temporary lapse in judgment. But what did I know? I was nine at the time.

We moved back to Shallow Lake, living in the aforementioned Grace guest house. I'd only been there for a few holidays over the years. My impression of the town was less than favorable. It looked like we were going to be stuck in some shitty dump that you could drive through without stopping.

And that's where we were until a few weeks before the start of my freshman year. Mom one day decided we were moving back to California. No explanation. If I didn't want to come, I was welcome to stay with my grandparents.

Hell would freeze over before I chose to spend a minute more than I had to in Shallow Lake.

But when my mom died, I didn't have any other choice. Grandpa Charles had moved to Florida right after Adrienne died, and the Grace estate had fallen to Nell. She offered to take me in and be my legal guardian for the next year.

So generous. She was only six years older than me. This whole relationship was going to be a joke. Nell was timid, emotional, and about as pretty as puppy dog missing an eye. You could tell she was supposed to be attractive, but no matter how hard you looked, you just couldn't see it.

Speaking of the devil, she was hovering in the doorway. "Thalia?" she said softly. "Are you okay?" Her eyes were teary. Oh God, I would not be able to take it if she cried.

"Yeah. Fine." I unzipped one of my bags and started throwing shirts into the dresser.

She didn't move. I think I heard her start sniffling. God help me. Mom didn't even like her. "I enrolled you in the school, but you can start whenever you feel comfortable. I explained the circumstances, and they said that-"

"I'll start tomorrow."

Anything to get out of this damn house.


	6. Water in the Brain

Here's a recap (in case you decided to skip chapters one through five)

Luke is a step away from getting suspended. It's only October. He had sex with Thalia during her grandma's funeral. She freaked out on him and left. Now she's back. Oh boy.  
Percy is the new kid at school. Annabeth doesn't like him, but she doesn't like most people.  
Grover's in jazz choir, but he doesn't think he can sing. He also might like Silena, but she thinks he's a loser.  
Thalia's mom is dead, and her aunt is kind of mopey. Oh, and her family is super rich.

And that's what you've missed. ;)

**Chapter Six  
****Water in the Brain**

"What are you doing, Luke?"

Smoking. Drinking. Watching Cake Boss – I swear it was the only thing on. But Mom could see that.

"You're home early."

_Quit dodging!_

_Shut up, Thalia!_ God, I was talking to myself.

I took a deep drag of my cigarette and held it in until it felt like my chest was about to explode. I actually stopped smoking a few weeks ago…for the millionth time. Stress always brought me back to the habit.

Mom wrinkled her nose. "Are you trying to kill yourself? And where'd you get that?" Her eyes flickered to the empty beer cans stacked up on the coffee table.

I shrugged. "I gave the creepy homeless guy who lives at the park ten bucks to go buy it for me."

"What's wrong with you?"

She apparently wanted an answer. Well, I wasn't about to give her one. "You're the one who raised me. Ask yourself."

Oh shit. I'd just set myself up for the same lecture I'd heard a million times. "I raised Chris. He's one of the best neurologists in the country. I raised-"

"Blake. Played college basketball. Kevin. CEO of some fancy company in New York. I know."

Her face was turning red and the veins on her neck were bulging. I was in for it. Whatever. "You know what's wrong with you? You don't care…about anything! You try to push the people who care about you away. And you know what the worst part is? You don't even-"

The doorbell rang. Mom sighed and stormed out of the room. "Answer the damn door."

I kind of considered staying put, but Cake Boss had ended, and Say Yes to the Dress was starting. Kill me now. I shut off the TV and walked to the door.

Well, if it wasn't my favorite UPS guy. "Package for you," he said. Today's was in a long and thin box. Again, it was addressed to my mom. When the hell did she get so popular?

"I heard screaming," he noted. Or maybe he meant it as a question. Whatever. He was a UPS guy. It was none of his business.

"Yeah. You did," I said.

"Is it the girl who gave you the hickey?" he asked.

"That was a mosquito." He gave me a look. It was one I'd seen Mom try a million times, the _I know you're lying so just tell the truth_ look. Only it actually kind of worked for him. "My mom was yelling."

He nodded eagerly. "Go on."

Yeah, I really was going to give a random UPS guy my life story. "There's this girl. And we…" I trailed off, not sure how personal I wanted to get.

"Slept together, keep going," he finished for me. I probably stood there with my mouth hanging open like an idiot, because he said, "I'm a good guesser."

"Okay, well, she freaked out and left. Like, 2,000 miles away left. And now she's back."

"And now you two are back together and your mom doesn't think you should be having sex with her," he said.

Yeah, not quite.

* * *

The first day of school was always death, especially when your mom died no more than two weeks ago, and people were torn between giving you fake sympathy and demanding where the hell you'd been for two years.

"Hey, who's that?"

"It's Thalia Grace. Remember? The Goth girl in middle school? I heard her mom jumped off a building."

Yeah, that's what I'd been hearing all day. One, I hadn't been Goth. The look had been more punk than anything. And two, my mom had not jumped off a building, been killed by African slave traders, or faked her death and tried to start up her acting career again under a different name. My God, people needed to get their own lives.

Only a few people had been courteous enough to actually say what they were thinking to my face.

Like Kelsey Forester. I wanted to ask her what had happened to her arm, but decided that wasn't a great way to greet one of the few people who'd been remotely friendly towards you.

"It's good that you're back, Thalia," she'd said with a smile. "Luke might quit being such a loner now."

Way to hit a soft spot. I'd asked her what she meant, and she'd just laughed. "He's been hung up on you since you left. Why'd you go, anyway?"

It took me a second to realize she was talking about my first exit, when we'd first moved to California. "Mom missed California," I lied. Well, technically I could have been right. I didn't know why we'd left in the first place, so my guess was as good as anyone's.

I'd gotten variations of the same question from a handful of people, but nothing from the one person I was most nervous to face.

Luke and I had four classes together: English, algebra, chemistry, and gym. He didn't give me anything. Not even a sideways glance when he thought I wasn't looking.

You could swear he was a girl based on how well he held a grudge.

So here I was, in my eighth hour study hall, just thinking about how stupid I was for losing my virginity to a guy I knew would never be anything more than trouble. That, and just how stupid I was for still wanting him.

It was probably some psychological thing. I lost my mom, and I wanted someone dependable to cling to.

Yeah, only I was seriously messed up if I considered Luke Castellan a dependable person.

This was pathetic. I was never the type of girl to sit around fantasizing about being Mrs. Thalia Insert Last Name Here, mostly because I saw how far it got my mom.

Again, it was probably some psychological thing. I couldn't handle the unimaginable grief of losing my mom, so I was instead focusing entirely on another emotion.

Ha. I needed to quit watching Celebrity Rehab. My inner voice of reason was starting to sound suspiciously like Doctor Drew.

That's when I decided that the only way to solve this was to talk to him.

And that's how I ended up at Luke's locker after school, trying frantically to think of something to say. Yeah, this was an extremely well thought out plan.

He gave me the look of death. "What do you want?" _Get lost, bitch._ I knew it was really what he wanted to say. Well, I could play things his way.

"How about your virginity? Oh, wait. I have that already."

"You think you were the first girl I slept with?" he shot back.

I rolled my eyes. "Since you weren't smart enough to use a condom, I'd say yes."

"If you were pregnant, you'd look like a whale by now."

"Oh, aren't you a charmer."

"I was good enough for you."

"You think I'd do the same thing twice? You're the last person on the face of this earth I'd want to be with. You wanna know why? You have all the empathy of a rock. You run away from commitment like it's an infectious disease. And-"

"Can I ask why the hell you came looking for me if all you wanted to do was act like my mom?" he interrupted.

"I can't stand you!" That hadn't come out that loud. The whole hallway wasn't staring, I tried to tell myself.

At times like these, it was best to just storm off.

And the worst thing was I still wanted him.

* * *

I'd never been swimming.

See, in New York, there weren't a million clean lakes everywhere. The only place you'd find pools was at the Y. And in order to get into the Y, you had to pay money, and that wasn't something we had a lot of.

Then we moved to Shallow Lake, and I got shuffled from school to school. Obviously, boarding schools didn't have swimming pools. The hippie school didn't even really have anything that resembled a gym. The only reason Shallow Lake High had a pool was because one of the alumni had gotten a medal in swimming at the Olympics and donated it.

No, it hadn't been Michael Phelps.

Anyway, in exchange for donating the pool, he asked that Shallow Lake incorporate swimming as part of their physical education curriculum. Oh, and that we get a swim team. From what I heard, they were okay. Nothing amazing, like the rest of the athletic departments in Shallow Lake were rumored to be.

I didn't care if I was amazing at swimming. I just didn't want to drown, or worse, become known as the loser who didn't know how to swim.

"Okay, everyone in the water," Mr. Mars said gruffly, pulling me out of head. Mr. Mars wore shorts pulled up to his chest and socks pulled up to his knees. Even so, I pictured him as the type to be in a leather vest driving a Harley when he wasn't in school.

A few girls squealed as they got in the pool. I braced myself for the worst, but to be honest, being in the water felt…normal.

One of the guys who I assumed was on the swim team started doing a lazy backstroke across the pool. Well, that didn't look hard. I was feeling more confident that I could do this.

Mr. Mars blew his whistle even though no one was talking. "One lap across the pool and back. Go," he shouted. I don't think he understood the concept of an indoor voice.

Just like that with no instruction, I was expected to know how to swim. I suppose when you lived in a town with the word lake in it, people assumed you at least knew the basics.

Here goes nothing, I thought to myself.

I started doing what felt natural. Later, I'd be told that it was a near-perfect breaststroke, though I had no idea what that was. Not to brag, but I was done before some people had even reached the far end of the pool.

"Jackson," Mr. Mars said/shouted. "Another lap. Go."

I knew it was too good to be true. He was probably making me go again so everyone could see a perfect example of what not to do.

Again, I went across the pool, this time trying to go as fast as possible to get it done with.

"Holy shit," I heard a girl say.

I finished my lap and looked at Mr. Mars, nervously waiting for whatever he wanted to say.

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "You swim at your old school, Jackson?"

"No…sir."

"Go out for the swim team. They could use someone like you." I wasn't sure if it was an idea or a demand. Probably both.

"We could actually do relays if we had someone who could do the breaststroke," the guy who'd been doing a backstroke before piped in.

"Shut up, Taklan. Well, what are you all looking at? Backstroke, two laps. Go!"

"I think swimmers are really cute," a hot blonde girl whispered to me before taking off. "A lot of girls do."

Swim team, here I come.


	7. A Whole New World

**Chapter Seven  
****A Whole New World**

"Katy Perry is pretty hot, but I'd rather do Taylor Swift. Then I'd get a song about me."

Whoa. This was a weird moment to walk into jazz choir.

"Hey, Grover," Jeff Salvator said. "What do you think: Katy Perry or Taylor Swift?"

I'd been in jazz choir for two weeks, and so far we'd done no singing and had a lot of conversations like this, which was fine with me. People were even being…nice. Of course, that ended as soon as practice was done, just like Silena had promised.

"Ummm…" I dropped my backpack on the floor and sat next to him and Silena.

Silena smacked her lips. "He obviously doesn't like either." Oh God. She didn't know. Did she? "Grover seems more like a…Nicki Minaj type."

Now was the time I was supposed to pipe in and say which singer I thought was drop-dead amazing, and all I could think about was Nick Pitera. He was amazing. "Yeah, umm…Nicki Minaj is okay, but I'd pick Lady Gaga over her."

"Imagine how freaky she'd been in bed!" Josh Hendrickson hooted from behind us. "What's the song about the disco stick?"

Kasey Forester rolled her eyes. "I'd go for Bruno Mars. He's amazing. Or Adam Lambert."

Agreed. I watched every episode of American Idol and actually voted for once when he was on it. Kris Allen had nothing on him.

"Eminem. I have a soft spot for bad boys," Silena admitted.

"Kesha," Mr. Sol shouted from his office. "This place about to blow," he sang in a falsetto.

Bianca di Angelo groaned from the back row where she'd been sitting silently the whole time. "You ever going to get that stupid Christmas music, Mr. Sol? I knew jazz choir was going to be a huge waste of my time."

She stood up and walked to the door. "Oh, and I'm having a party on Halloween. My house. Come in costume, or don't come at all. Spread the word, children."

Everyone waited until she was out the door before Carrie Frieder said what was on everyone's minds. "What a bitch."

Silena sighed. "You know the story."

"What story?" I asked.

Becky Nakamura stared at me. "Shut up. You don't know?" I shook my head. "Silena, you tell him."

Silena's eyes lit up, but she bit her lip like she felt bad about talking about Bianca behind her back. "Okay, so you know their dad. Owns the local funeral home and stuff?" I nodded. The di Angelo family had run it since Shallow Lake was founded. "Well, once upon a time there was a Mrs. Di Angelo.

"She was…well, a mail order bride from somewhere in South America. She stuck around with her husband long enough to give him two kids and get her US citizenship. Then she just took off – changed her name and everything. Bianca was only five. Her dad was crushed, so she pretty much had to be a mom to her younger brother. I'd say it entitles a girl to be a little ice princessy."

We were all quiet for a few seconds, then Josh broke the silence. "Silena, you know way too much about people. It's kinda creepy, but also really hot."

Yeah, typical day of jazz choir.

* * *

As far as teachers went, Mr. Brunner was pretty cool. He was an older guy and had to use a wheelchair. I bet he had been in a war or something cool. I hated history, but he actually made it kind of interesting…and that took talent.

That being said, I had no problem saying I hated him at the moment. He'd just assigned a giant project, and he was going to pick our partners. We had to take a giant piece of poster board and make a giant collage of what it was like to be a teen in whatever ancient society you got assigned or something. Oh, and you got to work in partners…that he picked.

"Taklan, Nakamura. You've got Rome. Underwood, Jackson – Greece."

Great. I was stuck with the class loser. Okay, maybe being the swim team prodigy was going to my head.

"Chase, Bostun. You're doing –"

"Lea has mono," a kid in the front row said. "She's gonna be out of school for like…three weeks."

Mr. Brunner didn't miss a beat. "Annabeth, you can go with Grover and Percy. Just remember, I'll expect more from a group of three."

He kept rattling off partners, but I wasn't listening. I was stuck with the class loser and the class overachiever. Things just didn't get any better. I didn't know anything about ancient Greece, and Annabeth was probably able to write a book about the complexities of their ancient society.

"Okay, get with your partners," Mr. Brunner said loudly. While some groups eagerly shifted desks to get closer together and gossip, the three of us reluctantly gathered around one of the back tables.

Annabeth immediately took charge. Go figure. "Well, we're obviously not going to have enough time to get it all done in class, so we'll have to work on it before and after school."

"I have swim practice after school," I immediately interjected.

"And I have jazz choir before school," Grover added nervously.

"You're in jazz choir?" Annabeth gave him a disbelieving look.

"Yeah. We're singing stuff from the Nightmare Before Christmas."

That movie scared the crap out of me when I was younger. Don't repeat that.

"Well," Annabeth started. "I guess I'll just do everything, because no way am I getting my GPA ruined because I'm stuck with you guys on a project that's worth 20 percent of our grade. 20 percent," she repeated. "And you probably don't even care. You probably think I'm a freak for caring about my grades, but one day when I'm a famous architect and you're just some random person living-"

"Annabeth. Relax. The project will get done," I butted in, worried that she was going to give herself a brain aneurism or something.

Thank God the bell rang right at that moment. Annabeth stormed out. "Wow. I'm having flashbacks to the first Harry Potter."

I laughed. "Yeah. Talk about Type A."

"Yeah, well…" he trailed off awkwardly. I could tell his social skills weren't the greatest. Or maybe talking to people just made him nervous.

"See you, Grover," I finished for him.

Maybe this history project wouldn't be death.

Yeah, and maybe I'd actually end up being friends with Annabeth and Grover.

* * *

Sometimes it was hard to hold your head up when people knew your mom was the town whore. Dima Beauregard might have been the best news anchor in our county, but that didn't change what people thought about her.

She had four kids, myself included. And it was obvious that we all had different dads. Of course, we were all drop-dead gorgeous. It came from having someone so impossibly beautiful for a mom. Yet each of us looked completely different, not even a common feature like eye color to unite us.

I'd never met my dad, but I didn't really care. He was probably some loser anyway.

The only thing I cared about was the reputation my mom, and all of her children by association, got. It was worse because we were in a small town where everyone had to know everything. But really, the people talking were only making me famous.

Speaking of which, I hadn't really done anything noteworthy lately. I'd been single for two weeks after breaking up with a guy from Vildesburg. I know, it was death, but Shallow Lake boys were so boring.

Except the ones that were off-limits, but that was a different story.

"Earth to Silena. Are you there?" Clarisse, my best friend, waved her hand in front of my face. "The Bachelor's almost on."

That's right, Clarisse La Rue liked to watch The Bachelor. I kept her secret, and she didn't tell the world that I ate like a pig and actually liked watching football – I told people I only watched to check out the players.

Way back when in grade school we'd discovered that we had a lot in common after spending three hours in the principal's office together after some stupid fight during recess. I think Clarisse had made a comment about my mom being pregnant again, but she claimed I'd told her she had a face that looked like a pig.

Anyway, we'd been secret friends since then. We both had an image to keep up, and being seen with each other would not be a good idea.

"Yeah. Pass the popcorn. Bianca di Angelo is having a Halloween party. We should go."

Clarisse snorted. "Yeah. Doesn't even make my top 500 list of things to do."

"Chris Rodriguez is going," I added.

Clarisse made a sound that could only be described as a girly little squeal. "Really? How do you know that? Is he really going? We should definitely go."

Well. That'd been easy. "I know everything. We can go as warrior princesses. It will be fun." I shoved a handful of popcorn in my mouth.

"Yeah. Fun. Whatever," she said gruffly, trying to play off her girly moment. "Who are you going for?"

"No one." I lied, giggling.

"Tell me who!" she insisted, easily putting me in a headlock.

I grabbed a handful of popcorn and threw it at her. "Stop! I'm not saying, and The Bachelor just started and you're missing it!"

"Really?" Clarisse immediately let go and stared at the TV. That girl was worse than me.

Thank God. Because no way was I admitting that I had a stupid crush on Luke Castellan.

And even stupider, I also maybe, just maybe had one on nerdy little Grover Underwood.


	8. Girl, Misunderstood

**Chapter Eight  
****Girl, Misunderstood**

I didn't get it.

I'd tried being nice, even though all I wanted to do was scream. Swallowing my pride wasn't easy for me.

And he'd responded by being completely neutral and reserved. For some reason, I thought this was worse than the snarky side of him. At least I knew how to deal with that. This Luke was more like a complete stranger.

So I crossed being nice off the list of ways to get him back. Being a bitch hadn't worked too well either. Go figure. I only had one option left, one I'd seen my mom use over and over again, but it'd always burned her in the end.

I had to try seducing him.

Why couldn't I just give up? Maybe life would have been easier if I just accepted he hated me, found different people to hang out with, and ignored him for the next two or so years.

Well, as the tagline goes, a woman's heart is an ocean of secrets – which, by the way, I've always thought was total bullshit. The whole movie it went with was bullshit, but whatever. That was completely irrelevant right now.

So I just had to seduce him. Not hard. If only I had some idea of how to do that.

And thinking of a plan was just going to have to wait. A certain annoying aunt was hovering in the doorway. The mom act was getting old. Really, she was only five years older than me.

"What do you want?"

I knew she was biting her lip and more than likely twirling her hair, two of her most annoying nervous habits. I bet she'd run away like a scared little rabbit if I gave her the glare I was suppressing. "Well, umm, I thought it would be good to start going through your mom's things. That is, unless it's too soon and you still feel…"

I wanted to tell her to grow a pair and just spit it out. "Yeah. Whatever. Most of her shit can go straight to Goodwill." Because I'm sure they just loved reselling $2,000 shoes and French lingerie.

Nell seemed torn between following me and staying put. "You don't need to help me. I'll just go through her clothes and stuff."

She breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm just not ready to look at her things yet." So it was okay for me to? "It's been less than a month, and it's just too soon for-"

"Yeah. Don't care." I brushed past her. "Get a therapist, and get over it."

Mom would have told me to quit being a little bitch and get of her way. Nell, on the other hand, broke down crying.

I pretended not to see.

* * *

If I got an A- in world history, my Ivy League dream was as good as gone. Any other school was a joke. Hey, I'm from the University of Michigan. Want me to design your vision? No one would take you seriously.

Of course, no one else understood that, Grover and Percy included.

This stupid project was going to be the death of me.

I'd made both of them do research last night. Really, it wasn't that hard, but I don't think Grover owned a computer, and Percy had pulled some excuse about having a swim meet in Blackston. Apparently, he was some swimming god and was going to take our team to state this year.

I really couldn't express how much I didn't care. Sports didn't rank too high on my priorities. Yeah, I did cross country and field, but that was solely for making my transcripts look good. Really, by the time you were thirty, no one cared if you won the state championship in basketball your junior year.

"So, what did we learn last night?" I asked. Well, demanded would probably be a more accurate term.

Percy looked up from doodling in his notebook. "The Greeks believed in all these gods and stuff. They killed their cows and goats so the gods wouldn't strike them down with lightning or something."

I ground my teeth and took a deep breath. He'd tried. He'd failed miserably, but he'd tried.

"But the gods really liked the people and would have kids with them. Only…things never really…you know…worked out for the kids…." Grover added.

Hello, I am a Greek teen. We just sacrificed our favorite cow so the gods wouldn't smite us. Oh, and I'm pretty sure one of the gods is my dad.

Without me, they would have failed. Epically.

"Are you going to Bianca di Angelo's party this weekend?" Grover blurted out. I was ready to tell him off, but then I realized he was talking to Percy, not me. Yeah, just ignore the person who's going to do this giant project for you.

Percy shrugged uncomfortably. "We have a meet at Degis. Don't know when we're gonna get back," he mumbled. "Besides, isn't their house like…above the funeral home? That's just creepy."

"Yeah, the family's kind of weird. Their dad is all big and scary, and Bianca – she's the older sister – is kind of a diva. Nico's in middle school, and he's kind of…different. Like all emo and stuff," Grover explained. I wanted to tell him that I really didn't think Percy wanted to be briefed on all things di Angelo.

"Oh. Well, good to know."

"Okay, well this project is due next week. You two don't know anything, so I'm going to do it myself this weekend. I'll even throw some typos in so it looks like you actually did something." I thought I was being pretty generous.

"Sure. Thanks," Grover said, then went back to telling Percy all about Shallow Lake's social system.

One day when I was famous and they were cashiers at McDonald's, they'd be sorry.


	9. Love at First Fright

**Chapter Nine  
****Love At First Fright**

The Degis meet had gone okay. We'd taken second out of twelve schools. On the ride back home, Josh had explained that Degis was amazing at everything; academics, athletics, even their music department…they always placed in the top three at everything. People had really hoped we'd beat them at swimming.

And they'd come in first.

"Second's okay, but people really wanted us to get first. See how Coach is just sitting up there fuming? We're going to get it at practice Monday," Josh said with a groan. "But, like, we don't blame you." Meaning they did. "You'll get better after you practice more."

I didn't say anything. We were almost back to Shallow Lake, so it was time to call my ride home. After Mom had married Gabe, she'd gotten us really nice phones, something we never would have been able to afford before.

"Percy?" she picked up after the third ring. "How did your meet go?"

"Fine," I mumbled. "We're almost home, so can you come pick me up?"

There were a few seconds of silence, though I swear I could hear someone talking in the background, and he did not sound like Gabe. "I'm sorry, honey. I had to go out of town for…one of my classes. I think Gabe is home though."

Yeah, I'd walk the five miles home before I called Gabe. "Okay."

"I have to go. I'll be home tomorrow afternoon, and then you can tell me all about the meet. Love you, honey." She hung up. I had a feeling she was lying to me.

"Are you going to the party at the funeral home?" Josh asked. "It's probably just starting now."

I looked at the time on my phone. It was a little past ten. "Nah. I don't have a costume."

"Throw on some goggles and call yourself Michael Phelps," the guy sitting behind us said. "You really think people are gonna dress up? We're not in second grade anymore. I got my parents' van tonight. You wanna drive over with us?"

As great as it felt to be included, I really didn't like parties, especially when everyone knew each other, and you were destined to be the new kid standing in the corner while everyone hooked up. "No. I'm really tired."

"Whatever. Suit yourself. You know, Silena's single again," the guy said to Josh. "Think I'll get lucky?"

"Depends on how wasted she is," Josh laughed.

The bus pulled into the school's back parking lot. In a matter of a few minutes, everyone had left…probably all heading to the party. Maybe it would have been better if I'd just went with them.

I sat down on the curb. This had been smart. I didn't want to go home to Smelly Gabe, but I had nowhere else to go.

"You need a ride?"

"Grover!" He'd just about scared the life out of me. "You shouldn't sneak up on people like that. What are you doing here?"

His face turned red. "Sorry. Umm…I was here…you know. Do you need a ride?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know?"

"I just don't really want to go home." Might as well be honest.

"Oh, well…you can come…to my house…if you want to…" he said shyly, like he expected me to turn him down without a second thought.

It was Halloween. Everyone else was at a party, so no one would know. And I kind of felt bad saying no, especially when it was obvious that I had nowhere else to go. "Sure."

His face lit up. "So you're not going to the party either?"

"Not really my thing."

Grover nodded. "Me too."

Some Hilary Duff song started playing. Grover's face turned red again, and he pulled a crappy flip phone out of his pocket. "Yeah...oh…okay…yeah, sure…bye."

He looked embarrassed. "Our truck broke down. My dad thinks he can fix it, but it'll take a few hours."

He sat down on the curb next to me. "You know, we could…go to the party?"

"Yeah. Just until your dad gets here."

I had a feeling this was going to be a bad idea.

* * *

"Pretty awesome party, right?" a frat boy with a cup of something that was definitely not fruit punch yelled over the booming music – a remix of Thriller mashed together with every other Halloween song imaginable.

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah. Great." So far I was feeling really stupid. I'd worn this stupid slutty genie costume for nothing – Diana Grace had somehow made it look fashionable, I swear.

He wasn't going to come.

"What's up your ass, bitch?" he probably meant it to sound taunting, but the drunken slur kind of ruined the effect. "I planned this party. You want my card?"

"No."

My eyes wandered over to the entrance. There he was in some crappy costume. Fuck. I was not ready for this.

Mr. Frat Boy Party Planner slipped something into my hand. "Instant courage. It's totally healthy," he promised.

"I'll take two."

"That's intense. Good luck."

I looked down at the little pills in my hand. They were pink and yellow, one with a dinosaur on it and the other a big smiley face. This was definitely safe. Definitely legal.

* * *

I didn't think so many people would show up to a stupid Halloween party. It wasn't like my sister was popular. She'd never even had a real boyfriend, but the guy she was making out with on our couch didn't seem to notice.

She'd hired some skeevy party planner who seemed to have three loves in life: drugs, beer, and cheap Hawaiian shirts. He'd probably never amount to anything in real life, but the guy did know how to make a party pretty rowdy.

I wasn't supposed to leave my room all night by order of Bianca, but screw that. She wasn't my mom, even if she pretended to be. My real mom was probably a porn star in California by now or something equally epic.

All I wanted to do was find someone who wasn't too busy getting some to hang out with for the night. Oh, and maybe get some beer. That would be good.

I did a quick scan of the room. There were guys dancing with scantily clad girls grinding up on them, several couples making out on scattered pieces of furniture, and only a few people standing on the edge of everything.

One of them was Grover Underwood. My sister told me she thought he was gay, and I wanted to know if she was right.

Bianca and I were pretty open with each other. She'd known I was bi since I'd had my Barbies and GI Joes act out tea parties followed by nuclear wars. Of course, Dad didn't know, but he also didn't know Bianca hated Shallow Lake and planned on going to college in Maine.

The point of the story is she kept her eyes open for me, and she told me that Grover was definitely gay. Bianca had some kind of hidden gaydar. Lance Bass? She called it.

"Hey," I whispered from behind him. "Wanna come up to my room?"

Grover jerked around to face me. "Oh, uh…yeah. Sure."

He seemed nervous. I reached into one of the candy dishes and pulled out a tablet. I was pretty sure it was ecstasy – completely harmless, unless you mixed and matched your drugs.

"Take this. It'll help you loosen up."

Grover tensed up even more. "Look, I know you're gay." That had been smooth.

Grover grabbed the pill out of my hand and swallowed in one fast motion. "No, I'm not."

"Let's go up to my room."

Yeah, except just as I said that, I saw some guy carrying his girlfriend into my room.

Gross. I was making Bianca wash my sheets when this was all over.

* * *

I'd been a little drunk before I decided to come to the party, but this wasn't the normal buzz felt like.

My best guess was the colorful candies in the little bowls all around the house had definitely not been Sweet Tarts. I'd been at the party for twenty minutes and already things were starting to get really weird.

Everything in the room seemed brighter, despite the scattered lighting. That, and things were starting to spin and blur together. People seemed to be talking way too loud – I could hear every word over the blaring music.

These things were great to realize before you went and ate, like, twenty of the mystery pills.

But I wasn't feeling worried. In fact, I was feeling really…good.

All of the sudden, there was this genie sitting in my lap. I didn't realize genies were the type to go for zombies.

Wait, I forgot. I was only dressed up as a zombie.

"Hey, Luke," she giggled. Her voice sounded familiar, but out of place, kind of like seeing your teacher at the grocery store or the mailman at the clinic. She ran her hands through my hair. "You haven't been very nice to me lately, but you can make it up."

I didn't know this girl. Or did I? Things were getting really blurry, and I couldn't think about anything for more than a few seconds. But she felt really good sitting on my lap, so I went along with it and started kissing her.

She spread her legs around me and pulled me closer. Whoa. "Pretty awesome party, right?" she whispered in my ear, planting kisses down my jawline.

She didn't really give me a chance to answer, because her mouth crashed against mine a few seconds later – or was it minutes? Time was either going really fast…or really slow. It was getting hard to tell the difference.

"This is fun, but I can think of something better to do," she hinted, her hand finding its way down my pants. "Let's go find a room."

I picked her up in my arms and stumbled upstairs. She was giggling the whole time. "You're really drunk," she laughed.

I found a room that had a bed and stepped in, making sure to shut and lock the door behind me.

And I have no idea what happened after that.

* * *

"Well, my room is being…occupied, so this is my dad's."

Everything was black. The carpet, the walls, the bedding…everything. No wonder Nico was emo. "I know it's kind of dark. Dad's not really a happy person."

He'd gone into a pretty good career choice then. "I'm not gay. I just don't really like parties, and I was in town late working on singing with Mr. Sol, and then my dad's car broke down, and I needed somewhere to stay, and-"

Nico kissed me. I'd never been kissed before, but from the way my lips were tingling, I think it was safe to say I was as gay as it got. "It's okay. I'm bi. I get it. People in a small town don't understand us."

Us. I kind of liked the way that sounded. Nico kissed me again. "Look, I don't want to be your boyfriend. I just want a friend – someone I can talk to. You know?"

Okay, it was true I thought Nico was good-looking, even if he was kind of…emo. But I didn't really know him.

Then again, he was the only other gay person in this town. A friend I could be honest with sounded good.

"Okay."

* * *

Mom and I clashed a lot. We argued about politics, what to watch on TV, what college I should go to one day, what came first: the chicken or the egg…you get the point. If it was debatable, we argued. Usually, our arguments weren't too heated.

But not tonight. No, tonight had been a giant screaming match with no end. Mom said I needed to loosen up and do something fun. I told her to leave me alone – my GPA was at stake. She said I needed to think about seeing a shrink, and things had heated up from there.

Long story short, I wanted to be anywhere but home. I would never go to a party where there was drinking, among other illegal things. It was a fast way to lose any scholarships you might one day earn. But what was the harm in just walking by?

When I saw someone sitting on the curb outside the house, I almost thought about turning back for home. What if the person was a creepy rapist? Who else sat outside a funeral home at midnight?

Deep breaths. There was a party. Someone had probably just stepped outside for air.

And that someone was Percy Jackson.

"You here for the party, Annabeth?" he asked. He sounded really tired.

"No," I said honestly. I had nothing else to do, so I sat down next to him. "I needed to get out of my house."

Percy didn't say anything.

"It's a long story."

Again, nothing.

"You know-"

"Annabeth, I don't really know you, but you seem like a very…uptight person. If you want to talk, I'll sit here and listen, though," he interrupted.

_"Who's your mom? Come on, it's obvious it's not the lady you're living with."_

_"Luke! She's seven."_

I hated small towns. In any big city, no one would look twice at our family, but in Shallow Lake, everyone came to their own assumptions. Mom hated it just as much as I did – sometimes I think that hate got placed unjustly on me.

"My mom is Jamaican." I waited for Percy to say something.

"And?"

I sighed loudly. "Do I look Jamaican?"

"I guess not."

"My mom couldn't get pregnant. After five years, my mom and dad decided to try other…options." Now that' I'd started, the words came faster and faster. "My dad was professor at a college, so they had a lot of money. They hired this girl to donate her eggs and then carry a baby for them. After I was born, they moved here to get away from…my real mom. A few years later, things started working again for my mom. The doctors said it wasn't all that uncommon. Mom and Dad had their real kids, and I was just the…extra."

Wow. I really wish I hadn't said all that to someone who probably couldn't care less. Maybe Mom was right and I was just like a volcano, bottling stress and tension in until I exploded.

And maybe she'd been reading too many self-help books.

"That's it?"

"Do you not understand how a small town works? People judge you when you look different. People judge you when you act different. People judge you when you're not the perfect definition of what a person should be like."

"Just quit caring about what people think."

Someone stepped out of the house. Grover Underwood. The two of them had probably come together.

"Listen, I've had a long night, and it sounds like you have, too. I'm sorry you think your life sucks, but maybe if you weren't so…hard to relate to, I'd be able to help you more."

What the hell was that supposed to mean?

"My dad's just around the corner. You still want to spend the night at my house?" Grover asked Percy, who nodded.

"See you Monday," Percy said to me, then headed off with Grover.

Who the hell did he think he was?

* * *

My mouth was dry, my clothes were off, and the girl next to me was crying.

The girl next to me. Thalia. Clothes off.

Oh shit. Just stay calm.

She had her back to me, so I traced small circles on her shoulder blades. "It's okay," I whispered. We just had sex, and the last thing I remembered was getting dressed for this party. Yeah, this was the antithesis of okay.

"Nothing…is okay," she choked out. I couldn't remember her ever crying. "My mom died, and I'm stuck living with my stupid aunt, and you've completely abandoned me except for when we're having sex, and-"

"It's okay," I repeated firmly. Man, I had the headache from hell. "I'm not leaving."

Thalia starting crying harder, almost like I hadn't said anything at all. "Do you know what it was like, getting pulled out of school to go identify my mom's body at the morgue? There was blood everywhere…and…she was just…there…dead…gone…" she trailed off.

If the way I was feeling was anything to go off of, Thalia was drunk – and she was definitely a weepy drunk.

I had no clue what to do. "Yeah, well…you're here now, with me. And I'm not leaving." I felt like a record stuck on repeat. What were you supposed to say? "You're strong. You'll get through it."

Thalia turned and faced me. She had mascara streaks running down her face and more tears were still falling. "Promise we'll stay together."

She'd never struck me as an insecure girl before, but this night seemed to be filled with firsts. "We'll stay together. I promise."

She put her head on my chest and kept crying. I put an arm around her and pulled her closer. "We should go home." How we'd get there, I didn't know. Neither of us was in a state to be driving. And I walked here…I think.

"I don't want to go home. That's where Nell is. I hate her," Thalia whispered into my chest. "Let's go to your house."

I tried to figure out the chance of Mom being home. She'd left for some party somewhere and hadn't said when she'd be back. "Okay. Get dressed," I agreed.

Thalia got out of bed and grabbed a pile of fabric that looked mostly sheer. Once she had it on, I saw that it was basically a bikini with a lot of mesh covering her stomach and legs. "It was my mom's. I found it going through her stuff. Now are you going to quit staring and get dressed?" She was starting to sound more like herself

I grabbed my clothes and quickly pulled them on. "Let's go."

The clock in the hallway said it was a little after four. Most people had gone home, but there were still scattered people making out in corners. Bianca was going to have fun cleaning all this up. Furniture had been turned over, Styrofoam cups were everywhere, and the whole place smelled like beer.

Thalia slipped her hand in mine. "I'm really tired," she yawned. "Let's hurry up."

"My house is only a few blocks from here."

She didn't say anything. I looked over at her and saw she'd fell asleep right on her feet. Deciding it was better not to wake her up, I picked her up in my arms and continued home.

I couldn't help but feel like I'd done this before.


	10. The Rumor Mill

**Chapter Ten  
****The Rumor Mill**

"Luke Morgan Castellan, get your ass down here!"

Thalia giggled. "Your middle name is Morgan? Isn't that kind of…girly?" She was lucky she was so cute.

This was how I loved to start out my mornings. "Tell you about it later," I groaned. My head was pounding, and everything that had happened last night was kind of hazy. Something told me Mom was going to be less than sympathetic.

I was right. The screaming started the second I walked into the kitchen. "Why is Thalia up in your room? Don't think I didn't hear you two stumble in this morning. I thought you'd have more class than that – the girl's mom just died. But you just love taking advantage of people, don't you? I hope you don't get in trouble for being at that party. That's right, I knew about it. Word gets around in a small town. You're this close to being expelled. The school called me. It's October. How can you almost be expelled?"

I quit listening after the part about being classy, but tuned in to the very end. It's how I normally got through mom's rants, and she couldn't tell the difference. "I got caught drinking, then I was apparently being a smartass in history class. What happened next? I think I was looking at questionable content on the school computer. No, that was last year. I remember now; I broke Kelsey Forester's arm." Lack of sleep factored in with a killer hangover brought out my inner smartass.

Okay, maybe a little too much so. Mom was shaking, like literally, shaking. She narrowed her eyes. "I hope one day you realize what it's like to have a child half as terrible as you," she spat.

"You think I'm ever going to be stupid enough to have kids?" I returned her glare. She always backed down first, and today was no exception. She turned on her heels and started doing dishes with a ferocity that kind of scared me.

I turned around and headed back to my room. "I'm taking Thalia home."

"Don't rush back," she shouted.

No problem.

Thalia was sitting on my bed, staring at my phone. She'd thrown her costume in the trash and was wearing one of my old shirts and a pair of basketball shorts. Only she could leave for two years, come back, and automatically think she was entitled to go through my stuff. Again, she was lucky she was so cute.

She glared at me and shoved the phone in my face. "Look at this."

"Nice phone."

"The text, dumbass."

It was from an unknown number. _there ws a nark the parti last nite. big trouble monday. b prepared. admit nthing._ Okay, seriously? Who texted like that? Well, besides the little kids in grade school who thought they were so cool because they had phones. Because of the sheer shittiness of their typing, it took me a few minutes to understand what they were trying to say.

"The whole high school was at that party. It's not like they can do anything?" She looked to me with wide eyes.

"This person is probably some nerd with no life. I bet it's not even true. And they wouldn't be able to suspend the whole school."

But if this was true, and Percy Jackson had gone there, I was in big trouble.

Shit. I hated being a fake mentor.

* * *

"I hated the party," Clarisse grumbled. "Thank God we left early."

Bianca di Angelo's party had been terrible. I'd never be able to get my shot at Luke as long as Thalia was around – that much was obvious. She'd been all over him at the party, and he hadn't seemed to be complaining.

I'd spent the rest of our little stay at the party making out with the new kid – the one on the swim team. He tasted like chlorine. I know, it was kind of really gross.

Oh, and Chris hadn't been there for Clarisse. Big deal. She still had a chance at him.

After maybe an hour or two at the party, we'd gone to my house and watched a few scary movies, followed by The Last Song. Clarisse pretended I made her watch it, but that lie was totally busted when I caught her drooling over Liam Hemsworth.

"Yeah. Halloween party. How junior high can you get?" I rolled my eyes and continued flipping through an old People magazine.

Clarisse groaned and put the TV on mute – she'd been watching a football game while I worked my way through a stack of tabloids. Sports just couldn't hold my interest like gossip could when I was in this kind of mood.

"Silena, you could have any guy you wanted at the snap of your fingers."

"Except the one I want," I argued. "And you only hated the party because Chris wasn't there."

"He probably left when he saw there was booze there. Basketball season is coming up, and you can't play if you get caught drinking," Clarisse protested. "Remember last year when track almost went to state? Then Castellan got kicked off the team because he got caught smoking."

I tried to hide my reaction. I still hadn't told Clarisse about my hopeless crush on Luke, and there was no reason to now that Thalia had him in her slutty little clutches. I mean, really? Did you see what she was wearing? Apparently girls without boobs had to find other ways of catching a guy's eye – like showing an unbelievable amount of skin.

I'd almost torn the People magazine in half. Real discreet.

Clarisse laughed. "Really? You like Luke? I'm sorry, but everyone knows that now that Thalia's back…"

I was fuming. "What? Just because the bitch was his best friend a million years ago? Did you hear them in the hallway the other day? They-"

"Slept together. Yeah, the whole school heard, and people have been betting on how long it would take them to get back together. And you saw them at the party. I'm sorry, but he's hers." She had this haughty expression on her face, all _oh, your guy has been snatched up by his undying love, but mine is still up for grabs._

I tell you, whoever thought this girl's only interests were cross country, basketball, and softball couldn't be more off. She was the definition of well-rounded: sports by day, The Bachelor and gossip by night. Except I was the only one who knew it.

And right now she was being a total bitch. Well, two could play at that game. "I heard a rumor that Chris really likes girls who are all boho earthy, like Katie Gardner. He'd totally go out with her if she went for guys like him."

Clarisse grunted. "Last week I heard rumors that you got a boob job over the summer and slept with the entire archery team. And we both know you'd never get work done, and you're still a virgin. People say shit just to hear their own voices."

That, and to make life a whole lot more interesting. "Whatever. Long story short, I can't get Luke. You can't get Chris. Let's go get some ice cream, watch The Notebook, and cry."

Clarisse got this wicked glint in her eyes. "Or…we figure out how we're going to get both of them."

"That'd be awesome. We could be, like, the school's power couples. But it's impossible."

She rolled her eyes. "Think about it. Who was Luke's best friend after Thalia left?"

Ooh. That's where she was going with this. I grinned. "Chris."

"They got into this big argument after Luke got kicked off the track team. Chris thought cheating was contagious or something, and he didn't want to get kicked off the baseball team when he was their starting shortstop. But, you know, that'd be water under the bridge if his girlfriend could just talk some sense into him." I wondered where she heard that. I was her number one source for gossip, and no one had told me that one.

"And his girlfriend could convince Chris of what a bitch Thalia is, and then he'd tell Luke, who would break up with her…and get together with the girlfriend's best friend!" I giggled excitedly.

"So all we need to do for us both to get what we want-"

"Is hook you up with Chris!"

I loved manipulating people. It definitely filled up some of my free time since The Hills had been cancelled.

Thalia wasn't going to know what hit her.


	11. Blame It On The Alcohol

Time for another recap. (:

Silena really wants Luke, but he's with Thalia now. She and Clarisse came up with a plan to manipulate Chris into getting Luke for Silena. Yeah, good luck.  
Percy is a really good swimmer, and he hopes the swim team will be his ticket to popularity. He also might be getting close with Grover, and he had a deep moment with Annabeth. Weird.  
Nico is bi, and he and Grover are bonding over their mutual interests.  
And there might have been a narc at the party at the di Angelo house. Uh oh.

**Chapter Eleven  
****Blame It On The Alcohol**

The admissions board at UMass Boston had better be pretty damn impressed by the fact that I was in jazz choir all through high school.

The opening notes of the Star Spangled Banner made me want to strangle someone. Having Carrie wailing off-key next to me didn't exactly help. She was only in jazz choir because she had a helpless crush on Josh, who had joined because he wanted to impress Kasey.

It was unfortunately impossible to ignore people who gossiped at volumes loud enough to wake the dead.

Mr. Sol waved his hand, cutting us off. "Do we suck that bad?" Carrie asked.

Not us. You.

He shrugged. "Less soprano, more bass. Smile; you're singing, not getting a root canal. Tenors sounded good, though."

Surprise, surprise. Grover Underwood was actually surprisingly good. He was quiet, but had a voice that projected well. The judges at music festival would love that and send us to state, and UMass would be even more impressed.

And my brother apparently had a thing with Grover now. He was in middle school and had a boyfriend – something I'd never managed to get in four years of high school. Whatever. Everything was easier for him; he didn't have to worry about holding a family together.

"One more time, and then we can be done for the day," Mr. Sol promised.

Silena groaned. "We sound find. We should be done now." People were quick to back her up.

"Is it true there was a narc at the party this weekend?" Josh asked. "Is the whole school gonna be suspended?"

Every single person was staring at Mr. Sol expectantly. They'd all been at my party, obviously. Everyone had. It wasn't my fault someone had had too big of a mouth and somehow a narc had gotten involved.

Mr. Sol sighed and walked to his office. He came out holding a piece of paper. "Staff," he recited. "It was come to our attention that many Shallow Lake students attended a party this past Halloween and participated in many illicit activities. Due to the impracticability of finding and punishing every last person in attendance, we shall be having an assembly in the new gym during first hour. Please take attendance and send your students there. We are unsure of how long the assembly will last."

"So we're not in trouble?" Kasey Forester asked. She'd already gone on about how she'd only showed up to be a designated driver for her sister. Save it for someone who cared.

He shrugged. "Beats me." The expression on his face said otherwise. "You guys should probably get to your first hour class."

We still had twenty minutes.

Apparently no one else cared; they all grabbed their backpacks and left.

That left me alone with Mr. Sol, and he was giving me this sympathetic look that made me want to slap him. "You know you're gonna be in pretty deep shit for this, right?"

I'd been trying not to think about it. "Sure."

"My advice? Start playing the blame game. Fast."

I glared at him. "How?"

"Say you invited a few friends, then some jocks showed up with a keg of beer. Pretty soon the whole school was at your house, and you couldn't do anything about it. You didn't want to get anyone in trouble, so you kept quiet about it."

"You really think that'll work?"

"You don't really have any other choices, Bianca. Oh, and blame Luke Castellan. He's getting suspended, anyway."

I knew he'd known more than he told the whole jazz choir. "Why are you helping me?"

He seemed kind of uncomfortable, or maybe I was imagining it. "You're a good kid. I don't want to see you lose your whole future over one dumb mistake."

Okay, this had taken a turn for the weird. "Yeah. Well, thanks."

I had twenty minutes to get to the principal's office and lie through my teeth until I somewhat resembled an innocent and naïve girl who was guilty only by association.

* * *

It was only 8:15, and so far my day had sucked ass.

Silena had made me get up at 6:00 so she could do my hair. She insisted that her fruity styling products had made a difference, but I think it looked the same as it always did – like a big mop of curls that hadn't ever seen a brush.

Then she'd made me wear this girly pink Hollister shirt my dad had sent for Christmas, along with a pair of jeans. For a girl who normally wore old basketball camp shirts and sweatpants, it felt like being a fish out of water.

Next I'd found out that instead of my first hour gym class, I had to go to some stupid assembly. Apparently the entire school was in trouble because of the party last weekend. As long as we didn't have to forfeit games because of all the idiots who'd been drinking, I could care less.

The gym wasn't meant to hold this many people, and our school was too cheap to turn the air conditioning on. My cute little Hollister shirt probably had multiple sweat stains by now. I really hated Silena sometimes.

Chris Rodriguez was sitting ten feet away. I could just stand up and walk over to him, and from the looks Silena was shooting me, that's exactly what she wanted me to do. I wish I'd never told her I liked him.

Mr. Aguila, our short little principal who thought he was king of the world, stepped up to his makeshift podium in the middle of the court. "Students, listen up," he said in a tone so pompous you'd think he was the president giving his inaugural speech.

"I'm sure you all know by now why you're here. The school has been informed of a party that took place this weekend, and which many of you made poor choices and chose to do things that violated the our school's drugs and alcohol policy."

A piece of paper hit me in the back of the head. Guess who.

_Go sit next to him!_ It looked like she'd written it with lip liner. I rolled my eyes and crumpled it up, hoping she'd get the message.

"Now, it's impossible to know exactly who was or wasn't at the party, so our school board has decided to try something different. No one, save a few select individuals, will be punished for what went on this past weekend. However, our zero tolerance for drugs and alcohol will now be stricter than ever. Anyone caught using illicit substances for the remainder of this year will be suspended. No questions asked."

I bet he wished he had a gavel so he could bang it down. It would have added a nice touch.

"Those of you who participate in athletics are lucky there are no upcoming games." Well, obviously. Fall sports had just ended, and practice for winter sports wouldn't start for another two weeks. "We would have forfeited any scheduled events." Good thing the football team had sucked this year. They could still have been playing playoff games.

"Luke got suspended," some loud-mouthed girl sitting behind me said. "Three weeks. He got blamed for like…everything."

"That's just not right." I recognized Silena's voice. "I mean, if anyone's getting slapped on the wrist, it should be Bianca."

Three weeks. That was intense, but honestly, he had it coming. I don't know what Silena saw in him – he was just trouble waiting to happen.

And usually, you didn't have to wait long.

"Now, for the remainder of the hour, we have some people from the clinic who have so graciously decided to come in to talk about the harmful effects of drugs and alcohol," Mr. Aguila went on, though most people weren't listening at this point.

Yup. This day sucked ass. Majorly.


	12. Girl Power

**Chapter Twelve  
****Girl Power**

I was expecting to be able to drive home without someone running out in front of my car screaming at me.

Selfish, I know.

If that person hadn't happened to be my very pissed girlfriend, I might have just kept on driving and hoped they moved. But then again, I really didn't want the very real reason of manslaughter added to the list of completely false reasons I was getting suspended.

Very generously, I stopped. She stormed into the passenger seat and slammed the door. "Well? You're just driving away? No fight or anything?"

"13 days off of school. Why would I?"

She was fuming. "I don't know if you realize this, but pretty soon we're going to be applying to colleges."

"They don't see your disciplinary record."

"But they do see your GPA."

"I don't even show up to half my classes anyway. It won't be that big of a deal."

"Does anything get through to you?" she hissed. "You want to be stuck living in this town working at Gas and Grub for the rest of your life? Because that's all you're headed for right now."

If I'd been listening to her, I might have actually agreed with what she was saying, but I'd become really good over the years at toning out shouting. "Thank you, Mom. That was a very nice speech."

"You're such a smartass," she groaned. "Sometimes I wonder why I even try. Can you just take me home?"

I remembered that I'd picked her up this morning. Driving away without the girlfriend – I was definitely going to lose boyfriend points. Whatever.

Thalia sat there with her arms folded across her chest, staring out the window. "Do you care about anything?" she finally asked.

I turned the radio up.

"Don't ignore me!" She shut the radio off. Well, someone was in a bitchy mood. "You know the empathetic part of the brain that allows you to actually have human emotions? I think you were born without it."

"I'll go back and argue with the school after I drop you off. Would that make you happy?" Anything to get her to stop shouting.

I saw her roll her eyes. "Whatever. You're just saying that."

Yeah, I kind of was, but whatever. I turned the radio back on and hoped she was done being a bitch.

"Pull over," she said suddenly.

Seeing as how she looked ready to jump out before I did, I pulled over without asking questions.

She barely made it out before she puked. I looked away until she got back in the car.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. That's the last time I ever eat school food."

She didn't say anything else besides a quick goodbye when I dropped her off.

I decided it was best not to pry.

* * *

The Star Spangled Banner was really starting to get old. It was a good thing Veteran's Day was tomorrow, because the song really put me in a bad mood.

Or maybe that was just Bianca rubbing off on me.

"Remember, you guys need to hold that last note out. Sopranos, you're flat. Tenors, you need to be louder." Mr. Sol had been getting more and more stressed over the last few days, even though he insisted he thought we were ready to perform.

Silena sighed loudly next to me. She'd also been more grumpy for the last week or so. "Can we be done now? I want to pick out my musical theater solo for festival."

Mr. Sol shrugged. Apparently he was sick of the Star Spangled Banner, too. "I guess so. Remember, come in here during your break. We'll go through it once and then go perform."

"And don't be too amazing or they'll want us to sing at basketball games and shit. Oh, wait. That won't be a problem since you all suck," Bianca muttered. Mr. Sol shot her a dirty look but didn't say anything.

Silena ignored her. "I'm singing Popular from Wicked," she announced to anyone who was listening. "And this year I'm going to state. The only reason I didn't last year was because I got laryngitis."

"You owe me twenty bucks," Carrie whispered behind me to Josh. "She's been single for three weeks now."

"Not true," he sputtered. "I saw her making out with the new kid at the Halloween party."

So that's why a "quick trip to the bathroom" had taken half an hour. Then I'd gone upstairs with Nico, come back down, and found him outside with Annabeth Chase. I know, it was weird.

"Her Facebook still says she's single. Twenty bucks."

I stood up and grabbed my bag. "Not doing a solo, Grover?" Mr. Sol asked. I felt my face turn red as everyone in the room looked at me.

"You should," Kasey gushed. "I mean, you have a really good voice and all."

"She's so fake that Barbie is jealous," Carrie whispered to Josh, giggling. I had to agree with her.

I shook my head as I walked out the door. "Not this year." Not any year. Going up in front of a group of strangers and singing a solo was a disaster waiting to happen.

Nico was waiting outside. "I thought you'd never be done."

"I didn't know you were waiting." We'd only hung out a few times since the Halloween party. "Why…were you waiting?"

He shrugged. "We never hang out."

"We weren't friends before. It would look weird if all the sudden we started hanging out."

Nico rolled his eyes. "You're so paranoid. Being in the closet is boring."

Yeah, my extremely radical Catholic parents would love to know that their son was gay. "What's wrong with being in the closet for now?"

"Whatever. Oh, Bianca knows. And our dad has a funeral out of town this Friday, so she says you can come over if you want." He chewed on his lip ring. It made him look almost…nervous?

"Yeah. Sure. I gotta go before everyone else leaves." I looked at the door. "Right after school?"

He nodded. "Cool. See you then."

Yeah, I just had to figure out a way to tell my parents that I was going over to the house where the "crazy devil worshipping party" had been.

I repeat, extremely radical Catholics.


	13. Desperation

**Chapter Thirteen  
****Desperation**

Thank God Veteran's Day was over. It meant two equally amazing things.

One: No more Star Spangled Banner at seven in the morning.

Two: Since Luke had somehow gotten his suspension reduced, today was his first day back. This was good because since Clarisse was taking her own sweet time getting into Chris' heart, I was going to have to start working on Luke by myself.

I mean, no wonder I was so good at getting into character for Popular, my musical theatre solo. It was like, the story of my life right now. I just had to try and help people who were so inclined to ignore my advice and continue on in their ignorant ways. They'd never find popularity, or love, or whatever.

And I needed to get with Luke fast. I'd been single for like…weeks. A girl like me had a reputation to keep up, or pretty soon rumors would be flying about how I'd pledged myself to a convent. In fact, this was the longest I'd stayed single since fifth grade.

And making out with that swimmer boy at the party didn't count. I didn't even know his name. And besides, he'd been pretty quick to run off after just a few minutes. He was probably just intimidated by someone as amazing as me.

"Hi, Lea. Hey, Ethan. Love the shirt, Katie!" I chirped as I strutted down the hallway. My shoes were a half size too small and starting to really pinch…so I was trying to be overly perky to keep it from showing on my face.

"Hey, Luke. Good to see you back." I winked and made sure to walk just a smidge too close to him so our arms brushed when we passed each other. "Thalia's been looking pretty bummed without you."

I know what you're thinking: why would I say that? Well, everyone knew he shied away from commitment. Like, he was a junior and Thalia was his first actual girlfriend. I'd be able to break that habit for him, but right now, a clingy girlfriend would be enough to make him run screaming in the other direction.

"Yeah? Cool," he said, not even giving me, wearing a skirt that was five inches shorter than the dress code, a second glance.

She'd brainwashed him more than I thought.

* * *

Like it or not, I was definitely still going to need Clarisse's help.

Swim practice had run late, so one of the older guys gave me a ride home. I thought it meant I was finally forgiven for losing the meet at Degis, but it turned out he just wanted to interrogate me.

"You know you're the only single guy on the swim team, Jackson?" he said. I think his name was either Jake or James.

I guess I'd never really thought about it. "No. Why?"

"We decided to warn you not to go for Silena anymore. She's easy, but…like, everyone's dated her. Everyone."

Was there anyone who didn't know about that? Grover had come up to me today and asked me about it. I guess I should have told him, since I'd more or less ditched him when Silena jumped me on the way to the bathroom.

"Okay. I won't." I wasn't going to, anyway. It wasn't like I'd never been to a coed school before. Any school with girls had someone like that, and you learned to stay away unless you were desperate.

Wait…did they all think I was desperate?

"We came up with a list of girls for you since you're new and all." Thank God he was pulling in my driveway. "The Gardner twins are really cute, and Lea Bostun has a thing for swimmers. Kasey Forester is okay too…as long as you don't mind girls who are high maintenance."

I suppose I should have been flattered that they cared, but really…I hadn't even turned 15 yet. I didn't want a girlfriend. "Umm, thanks," I mumbled, stepping out of the car. "We can talk more about it after practice tomorrow, okay?"

"Sure."

Our house was pretty nice, even before you compared it to the dumps we'd lived in before. It was three stories, which I loved, since I had the top floor all to myself. It made it easier to ignore Smelly Gabe.

Mom already had supper on the table. Spaghetti, pancakes, mashed potatoes…and all of it was…blue?

What the heck was going on?

"Hi, honey," Mom said, kissing me on the cheek. She must have noticed I was confused. "Oh, I was just craving all this. And it looks so much nicer blue, doesn't it?"

No comment.

Gabe strutted into the room like he was king of the universe or something and wrinkled his nose. "What the hell, Sally? You said we were making tacos tonight, not this blue shit." I clenched my fists. How could she let him talk to her like that?

"It's just food dye," Mom tried to explain.

"Food shouldn't be blue. If we sold blue food at Gas and Grub, would anyone buy it? No, it makes it look like it has a fucking disease. Now get your ass back in the kitchen and make something that's not blue." I could smell alcohol on his breath from five feet away.

Now would be the perfect time for her to stand up to him. It would have been amazing if not easy.

But he'd said worse things, and she'd never stood up for herself.

Mom turned around and headed back in the kitchen. I could hear her messing around with pots and pans. Really?

I wished we were still living in an apartment in New York with a crazy cat lady who sang in the shower way too loudly for a neighbor.

* * *

We had been watching some random action movie, had being the key word.

Somewhere between the opening credits and the first fistfight, Luke had lost interest in the plot and started dropping little hints about what he would like to do.

First, his hand had slowly shifted from my knee to the inside of my thigh, where he lightly started tracing circles. I bit my lip – it felt good…a little too good. And we were in my room, all alone, on the bed…

I laced my fingers in his and put his hand back in his lap. "Stop."

I tried to go back to watching the movie, but the plot was mediocre at best. All I saw was a lot of violence and blood with a delicate girl screaming perfectly on cue every few minutes. Yawn.

Apparently Luke was thinking the same thing again, because he started kissing my neck. "This movie sucks," he breathed. "Let's do something else."

I tried pushing him off. "Really, Luke? I said no."

"Why are you being such a bitch?" he whined, folding his arms across his chest and glaring at me.

"So I'm a bitch because I don't want to sleep with you?" The movie had hit the cliché quiet spot where the hero and the girl have their quiet moment together where they tell each other their most hidden secrets. In other words, it was suddenly really quiet after nonstop shooting and explosions.

"Well, why don't you want to?"

Maybe because my chest had grown a cup size in the last week, the puppy mill commercials on TV made me cry, and I couldn't get in a car without getting motion sickness. Maybe because when I was cleaning through a box of mom's clothes, I'd found my birth control pills wedged at the very bottom…and I realized I hadn't taken any since the day she died.

But I couldn't tell him that. My period was only four days late. I was worrying about nothing.

"I just don't want to. I have my period." I wished I did.

He immediately paled. That was the kind of reaction I'd expect from someone who grew up without any sisters. "Well…umm…" He was obviously embarrassed. "I'm just gonna go back to watching this movie that sucks and pretend we didn't just have this conversation."

We both pretended to watch the movie. Lots of explosions, lots of the hero making out with different women. Slowly, almost tentatively, he slid his hand into mine. I decided not to pull away – the gesture seemed innocent enough.

"I'm sorry," he finally said sheepishly. I didn't answer, but my resolve to stay mad was quickly slipping. "Thalia…umm…listen, this is embarrassing, but…I had a fight with my mom before I came here and she kinda made it clear she didn't want to see me back for a while, so…"

"Really? Is it your raison d'être to piss her off in any way possible?"

He raised an eyebrow. "So you learned to speak French while you were in California?"

More like I was just an Adam Lambert fan, but that wasn't the point. He was trying to change the subject. "What was this fight about?"

He shrugged. "Can I spend the night here?"

"You can stay in the guesthouse if you tell me what the fight was about."

He sighed and stood up. I thought for a second that he was going to walk right out, but he just started pacing back and forth. "I'm failing half my classes, but whatever. I can fix that. But then she started going on about how everything is your fault."

"My fault?"

Luke shrugged. "I'll tell you if you don't make me stay in the guesthouse."

Touché. "Whatever. Fine."

"She says that you were a bad influence when we were little." I tried hard not to snort. She had it the wrong way around. "And then she started going on about how you just decided to leave with no excuse or anything." He started talking faster and faster. "And then apparently I started throwing myself away because I didn't care about anything and now you're back and think you can just act like you never did anything wrong…"

I bit my lip. Do not cry. Then he'll know something is wrong, I said to myself. "You know I don't know why we left."

"Yeah."

"And I'm sorry."

"Yeah." Someone was feeling talkative.

"Yeah?"

"I'm tired. Let's go to sleep."

If I hadn't been feeling completely drained, I would have yelled at him for trying to change the subject…again. "Fine." I shut the TV off. "You can stay in here."

Nell wouldn't like it, but she couldn't really complain. It wasn't like we were having sex. In fact, we were never going to have sex again if I could just get my stupid period.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. Fine. Why wouldn't I be?"

I had an impossible to ignore feeling that everything was going to hell.


	14. Head In The Game?

**Chapter Fourteen  
****Head In The Game?**

You knew things weren't good when your life could be summed up with a Taylor Swift song.

I guess it was my fault. Like, I should have seen this coming since the day Thalia had first showed up to babysit me and my younger brothers, Luke in tow.

And there they were six years later, walking down the hallway hand in hand. He whispered something to her and she smiled, though it didn't reach her eyes. Trouble in paradise?

One could only hope.

I didn't get it. One day he hated her, and the next they were inseparable. I didn't have friends who could tell me what was going on with them, and no way did I have the nerve to actually talk to him.

Really, I didn't get how she could make him happy. Even when they were younger, all they ever seemed to do was argue – about anything and everything. They both had the same bullheaded personality; obviously, they were bound to clash.

So all I had to do was wait for them to break up. My sixth hour study hall had a bet going on when it would happen, and who would break up with whom. Most people hadn't wagered past two weeks. Unfortunately, they were going on four.

I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I didn't realize I was about to run right into someone until it was too late. My geometry book and papers went flying everywhere. "Really?" I huffed.

"Sorry…ummm…" Percy Jackson.

Life really didn't get any better.

Out of all the people I could have told my life's sob story to, I picked him. Yes, it had taken an incredibly stupid lack of judgment on my part. I'd been trying to avoid him ever since, but that was easier said than done in a small school.

I tried grabbing my papers as fast as possible. He grabbed a few sheets and tentatively offered them to me. "I'm sorry."

"For what?" I demanded. Okay, that came off a little harsh.

He shrugged and fixed his gaze on the floor, mumbled something, and kept walking.

If I was Taylor Swift, I could have written a song about the whole thing, the song would go triple platinum, and I'd end up getting whatever guy I wanted at the moment.

_But I'm not a princess. This ain't a fairytale._

Oh my God. I was quoting her.

Hopefully geometry was something impossibly hard. Anything to get my mind out of lala land.

* * *

November was the worst month of the year. All of the sports were done, unless you managed to qualify for playoff games.

Yeah, Shallow Lake's worst sports were all in the fall. We'd gotten the state championship in every sport at least once since our school had been founded…except football and volleyball. It was our shitty fall sports legacy.

Basketball practice didn't start until we got back from Thanksgiving break. Games didn't start until late December. I would have died of boredom if Shallow Lake didn't do open gym after school three times a week.

On this Friday, there was a group of middle school girls playing volleyball on one side of the gym, and some guys had started a game of basketball on the other. Real hard choice to decide who to play with.

One of the Stoll brothers saw me come over and waved. "La Rue! Grab a jersey – your team's down by 12."

A bag of yellow mesh jerseys was sitting on the sidelines. We used them for practice to keep track of teams. Most girls hated them because they stunk like sweat no matter how many times you washed them. I could care less.

The boys had been regional champs last year, and their team had been primarily sophomores and juniors. They were bound to make it to state this year unless their key players got hurt.

But focusing on the game at hand, it was obvious why one team had such a big lead. They had Chris Rodriguez and both Stoll brothers, who weren't all that great, but they made up for their lack of skills with their height. Travis was easily six and a half feet tall, and his brother wasn't far behind.

"Heads up!"

I caught the ball inches from my face and took off. The last time I'd played basketball had been at a local tournament last summer, and I was feeling pretty rusty. Not that I'd tell the guys that.

I went up for a layup and Chris was right there, easily tall enough to block me. I pivoted and passed the ball to the first flash of yellow I saw.

Was it just me or did Chris wait just a second too long before running off back into the action?

Half an hour later, most people had all but dropped out. When you ran an average of eight miles a day for three months, you still had energy left to burn. There was a reason I opted for cross country instead of volleyball.

Chris had even more energy left than me. And he definitely had his height going for him – at barely five and a half feet, most of the competition in basketball could tower over me. Another reason I'd decided volleyball wasn't for me.

"We're tied," he said, breathing slightly heavily. His shirt was soaked through with sweat. "Next point gets it."

Without another word, he was off. I chased after him, getting the rebound when he missed his shot and running down the court. I could do this. There was no one between me and the hoop.

Until Chris got too close and we both tripped over each other. I ended up right on top of him.

I stood up as quickly as possible and helped him up. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Fine." I would have died right there if he'd sprained an ankle. It was obvious after watching him play that he was bound to be one of our team's key players this year. "But I think we better leave this game at tied for now."

Normally, I never would have agreed to that.

But he was still holding the hand I'd used to help him up.

"Yeah. Agreed."

* * *

I'd only been to a funeral home twice. The first time had been when I was five and my great-aunt Girda had died. The second had been a few weeks ago, at the di Angelo Halloween party.

I had to say, without a horde of weeping relatives or drunken party kids, the mood was completely different. But then again, I was trying not to remember that just below my feet was a room where countless dead people were brought in and out.

The upstairs, aka the living area (bad choice of words…), looked normal, albeit a bit impersonal. It kind of reminded me of a big hotel suite. There were no seasonal art projects made in kindergarten up on display, family pictures on the fridge, or anything that showed that people regularly lived here.

Apparently that's what happened when you grew up without a mom.

Bianca strode past us into the kitchen. "Hi, Grover. Dad forgot to leave money for groceries…again. We could make…" She started rummaging through cupboards. "…mac and cheese with spaghetti noodles, cereal – wait, we don't have any milk. Or, we could…just get takeout," she finished, reaching her hand into a cookie jar and pulling out a wad of small bills.

"Let's get Chinese food," Nico immediately said.

Bianca quickly counted the money, then pulled out her cell phone and hit a number. "Yeah, we'll have an order of fried rice, two orders of mandarin chicken, and…" She looked at me. I shrugged. My family never had money for takeout, and my parents would never want to eat at a place so…un-American. "And an order of cashew chicken. Don't forget the fortune cookies."

I assumed their dad forgot to give Bianca grocery money a lot if she had the number for a Chinese restaurant on speed dial.

"I have to drive to Cramville to pick it up. I can trust you two alone for an hour, right?" Bianca fixed her brother with a glare.

Nico shrugged innocently. "We'll be fine."

She looked less than convinced, but she still left.

"I think she likes you," Nico said. "And she thinks it's right that you don't want to tell people in high school."

At least someone did. "My parents think I'm at Percy Jackson's house."

"Do they know you're out for jazz choir?"

"No. They don't come to my band concerts, either."

Nico gave me a look. "Are you one of those people who plans on hiding everything until you go to college in California and end up famous one day?"

Hiding: yes. Famous: me? Really? I couldn't get in front of my English class to give a speech without getting sick.

"I kind of don't want my parents to disown me," I said. Every one of my siblings had had some rebellious phase at one point or another. Gabby had dated a guy twelve years older than her when she was a senior in high school, Gram went through an obsession with all things Marilyn Manson, and Glenn had nearly blown up the school during a science experiment.

But that was all forgivable, because they grew out of it.

"Hey," Nico said, pulling me back to earth. "I get it."

He decided that we should play Xbox until his sister got home. I was happy for anything that didn't involve too much talking, even though blowing up zombies didn't make my list of top ten things to do.

And I learned that Chinese food was definitely not one of my favorite things to eat. But the fortune cookies were kind of cool…until I read mine.

_Happiness and love follow those who don't keep secrets._


	15. Let Us Give Thanks

**Chapter Fifteen  
****Let Us Give Thanks**

The Graces used to be one of the families that ran Shallow Lake.

Now, Grandpa had taken up residence in a condo on the coastline of Florida. Charlotte lived in Chicago with her filthy rich husband. And Mary had been in France for the last seven years, where apparently her knowledge of nuclear science was held in a much higher value.

I don't know why we even bothered getting together for Thanksgiving. Half of my family didn't even bother to show up to my mom's funeral. Blood is thicker than water, my ass.

Apparently it had been decided that we were all meeting up in Florida so Grandpa didn't have to travel. I really hadn't cared.

…until I realized just how airsick I got.

We were only halfway to Florida, and I was getting back from my fourth trip to the bathroom. "Do you always get this sick?" Nell whispered nervously. She was looking kind of green herself.

"Yeah," I lied, shoving a piece of gum in my mouth. My period was going on two weeks late. It was probably some weird side effect of coming off the pill. "I hate flying."

I cracked open my sociology textbook and hoped she'd get the hint that I didn't want to talk. It was a great and very effective idea…until I found out that reading only made me feel sicker. Frustrated, I slammed the book shut and put my head between my knees, groaning.

"We're only a half hour from Florida," Nell promised. "Charlotte and Mary are probably already there."

Charlotte and her four perfect kids. Mary and her boyfriend who didn't speak English.

I couldn't wait.

* * *

"Remind me why we're going to see Chris this year," I asked, maneuvering the car down the busy highway. Mom refused to drive for distances longer than half an hour.

"Slow down before you kill us both," she said, lips pressed and face white. "He and his wife decided they wanted to host Thanksgiving this year, and I saw no reason not to go."

Maybe because her ex-husband would be there with his wife and their kids. That didn't scream out awkward or anything.

Before the shit hits the fan, you should probably know a few things about my family.

Brian and May Cayford were the perfect couple. He ran his own business; she was a part-time nurse. He coached the soccer team, and she was head of the PTA. They lived in a cute little suburban neighborhood with their three sons, ages 17, 15, and 12.

Everything was great. You could even say everything was perfect. But then May screwed everything up. She went out and got pregnant with some other guy. Brian got a divorce, kicked May out of the house, and managed to get full custody of the kids before could even say, "I'm sorry."

Now I think that May could have easily gotten shared custody of her kids, or at least a nicer settlement in the divorce. But she was probably too shell-shocked about the whole thing to even defend herself. Like just because she was 37 and on the pill, she thought she couldn't get pregnant.

If you've got any deductive reasoning, you should be able to piece together the rest of the story, but in case you can't, here it is.

Mom moved into the old Castellan house back in Shallow Lake, got a new job, and had her kid. It was another boy, much to her disappointment, as if having a girl would have improved the situation somehow.

Chris was now 34, and, from what I gather, the classic overachiever. He graduated high school a year early, went to some Ivy League medical school on a full scholarship, and currently owned his own private practice – which had a reputation for being one of the best in the country. From the Christmas cards we got every year, it seemed like he also had the perfect family – a total milf of a wife and two kids who looked just like him.

Blake must have really resented Mom, because he never reached out to her after the divorce. Ever. I don't even know how she knew what he'd been doing for the last 17 years. Maybe Chris kept her updated – he was, after all, the perfect son.

Then there's Kevin. It was weird to think that my brother closest in age to me was a good 12 years older. He was the CEO of some big athletic wear company. One time Chris had come to visit when I was younger, and Kevin had tagged along. He spent the whole time on his Blackberry, except for a few seconds when he looked up and told me he was sorry I was stuck with Mom.

He was definitely my favorite.

* * *

Chelsea and Marcus, Charlotte's two younger kids, were playing Monopoly on the floor. Caleb, a year older than me, was on the phone with his girlfriend. Mattie had tried talking to me, but she was a 15-year-old who loved Justin Bieber and Twilight. In other words, there wasn't a lot of common ground.

Charlotte, Mary, and Nell were in the kitchen, and, judging by the smell, something was burning. Michael, Charlotte's husband, was awkwardly trying to make conversation with Antoine, the aforementioned boyfriend who didn't speak English.

It was the first year without Adrienne and Diana, and things weren't any different. Well, minus the snide remarks about how Charlotte had gained weight, Mary was getting uglier by the year, and the grandkids were all spoiled brats. Damn Grandma Adrienne – even when she was gone, I could still hear her voice in my head.

"It sure is quieter this year." Sometimes I swear Grandpa could read my mind. He sat down next to me on the couch. "You like football?"

I didn't even know who was playing – the only reason I'd turned the TV on was to make things seem less quiet. "It's Thanksgiving."

"Yeah, me too."

Grandpa was never the type to say much – Adrienne did plenty of that. Sometimes I wondered if they ever really loved each other. Whenever I asked Mom, she would give me a look and say, "They have four kids, don't they?"

It wasn't even worth pointing out the flaws in her thinking.

"Something's different about you," he finally said quietly.

No way. He couldn't tell. "I cut my hair. My California tan is gone. Oh, and my mom died. You might have heard about it."

He cringed. "Sometimes I think you have a little too much of your mother in you."

Maybe that had been just a little bit harsh. "I'm sorry."

The fire alarm started going off. "Don't worry…we've got it under control!" Charlotte shouted from the kitchen.

"Hope everyone likes their turkey well done," Mary added. Well, that's what I think she said. She'd picked up a really strong French accent.

Grandpa smiled at me. I could tell he was trying hard not to laugh. "Want to run to the grocery store with me?"

I didn't have anything better to do.

We'd been driving for a few minutes before Grandpa said anything. "School okay?"

"Yeah."

"How's Nell?"

"Different from Mom."

He waited a second before shutting off the radio and asking, "So…you want to tell me what's really wrong?"

* * *

Stephanie rolled her eyes. "I really don't want to go back there any time soon."

I agreed with her. You could cut the tension in that house with a knife.

It started when Mom's ex-husband showed up…with his wife and their twin daughters, Lena and Kirsten. To be brutally honest, this new wife was young enough to be his daughter. In fact, she was probably about Chris' age. And she had another teenaged daughter who stood out like the black kid on _Easy A_ – Stephanie.

One of Chris' kids had the flu, and his wife was sulking because she had wanted to go to Maui for the holiday. I was starting to see that Chris had married her for her looks.

Blake had decided to bring an unexpected guest. Her name was Kandi or Caramel….something very stripper-esque. And she had the looks to go with it. Apparently, they'd been dating for a little less than a year, and she was pregnant. Since no one knew about this either, I assumed he must have hated the whole family – it wasn't anything special just towards Mom.

Kevin was desperately trying to get his company ready for Black Friday. Apparently, there was a shortage of basketball shoes. I didn't know who in their right mind wanted to wake up at three in the morning to go buy shoes…but since he looked ready to throw his Blackberry at the wall, I decided to keep my mouth shut.

Then there was the whole tension between Mom and Brian – you could tell they were trying to ignore each other, but kept sneaking looks. Wife Number Two was desperately trying to get her husband to pay attention to her, but he was busy talking with his oldest son.

Marissa, Chris' wife, stormed out of the kitchen. She looked downright pissed…and very scary. "Chris, did you pick up everything on the list I gave you?"

Chris looked annoyed to be interrupted in the middle of his conversation with his dad. They were probably talking about what it was like to be self-proclaimed masters of the universe. "Yes," he said curtly.

"Then why don't we have a damn turkey?"

"You probably didn't put it on the list."

"Oh, so-"

"I'll go pick one up," Stephanie piped in. It was the first time I'd heard her speak – she'd been quietly sitting on a couch with her sisters this whole time.

"My car costs more than you'll make in your entire lifetime," Brian said condescendingly. "No."

After only half an hour I was ready to punch this guy. It made me wonder how Mom put up with him for 20 years. "I'll take her."

No one said anything. "Come on," Stephanie brushed past me, pulling me along. Her perfume was way too strong – she smelled like a walking Hollister store. But I guess she was kind of pretty.

And that was how we'd ended up in the car together, aimlessly wandering the city after she'd confessed she had no clue where any grocery stores were…let alone one that was open on Thanksgiving.

"Aren't my sisters creepy? Like, the girls on _The Great Outdoors_ have nothing on them. And Brian hates me. You know, he gave me a credit card with a limit of ten grand on the agreement that I'd stay out of his way. And Chris is just like him. Kevin's headed for a nervous breakdown before he turns forty. Did you see how stressed he was?" Stephanie made an imitation of him on his Blackberry. "Kevin doesn't seem that bad. He just doesn't know where he fits in the family."

I sighed. "Do you always talk this much?"

"Only with people who don't talk at all." She smacked her lips. Pretty soon I knew her whole life story. Her mom had dropped out of high school when she'd gotten pregnant and married Brian when she was 20. That didn't scream gold digger or anything.

"Chris told me your story," she finished. It'd been half an hour since this girl started talking, and I'd driven through the entire city without seeing a single Wal-Mart.

"So do you have a girlfriend?"

I suppose I did, even if Thalia wasn't ever inclined to act like it. Lately, she'd alternated from being passive and distant to grumpy and aggressive. And forget about sex – she always found some excuse.

"Not really."

Stephanie grinned. "Pull over here."

And that was how we'd ended up in the backseat together, her tongue down my throat. I guess I felt a little bit guilty, but it wasn't like I cared about her. I just didn't want to go back to that hellhole of a house.

Okay, and maybe she was kind of fun. It was nice to know she wouldn't turn around and bitch at me tomorrow, since I'd never see her again.

I'd be extra nice to Thalia next week. That would make up for it.

* * *

My mom and Gabe were both only children with dead parents. With our huge family, it sure made for a lively Thanksgiving.

At least Mom was a good cook, even if lately she'd been making everything blue. I liked to think it was just to spite Gabe. Unfortunately, it probably had more to do with the weird cravings she'd been having.

"…and that's how we managed to double our profits last month," Smelly Gabe finished a long-winded story about his store.

Mom picked absently at her food. "Wow. That's great." I have her props for trying to sound interested.

I checked my phone under the table. Grover had texted me asking for help on math, and we'd been talking on and off all day.

_3 pregnant women, identical twin 2 year olds, and like 15 nieces and nephews running around the house. I'd trade places with u._ Apparently Grover came from one of those creepy huge families, but he was the youngest.

_It's 2 quiet here. B careful what u wish for._

Mom cleared her throat. "Well…ummm…I don't exactly know how to say this, but…" She was smiling. Maybe she was announcing she wanted a divorce.

And then, with no further warning, she spoke the two words that completely shattered my illusion of her in a loveless marriage with Smelly Gabe.

"I'm pregnant."

* * *

Grandpa and I walked through the busy store. "You promise not to tell anyone…including Nell?"

"Of course." He grabbed a few bags of chips. "It'll be between me and you."

"No judgment?"

"None."

I bit my lip. Saying it out loud would mean acknowledging it could be true. And as slim as it was, there was still a chance this wasn't really happening. I didn't want my grandpa to think I was some slut for no reason.

And he said he wouldn't tell Nell, but once he knew, he definitely would.

Grandpa touched my arm lightly. Somehow we'd ended up in the…feminine aisle. I would have asked him how he'd known, but then I realized I'd been the one pushing the cart – I'd been the one who led us here.

I guess there was no turning back now.

I grabbed a pregnancy test.


	16. The Indestructible Power of a Nokia

_Note to my lovelies: I swear a part of my soul dies every time someone asks if I'll do POV announcements. If you're really that confused, leave a note in your review and I'd be happy to explain._

It's time for another recap. (:

Bianca blamed Luke for everything that happened at her party. He got suspended.  
Things are shaky with Thalia and Luke, and Silena and Annabeth are both really hoping they break up.  
Grover and Nico are getting closer, but Grover is adamant about staying in the closet.  
Clarisse thinks Chris just might like her, but she's not the type to go all crazy for a guy, or so she says.  
Luke's family is really rich. Kind of snobbish. And he made out with his mom's ex-husband's stepdaughter at Thanksgiving.  
Sally is pregnant. And Thalia's starting to believe she is, but no way in hell is she telling Luke.

And that's what you've missed!

**Chapter Sixteen  
****The Indestructible Power of a Nokia**

"I'm sorry…Daph, there's nothing I can…yeah…whatever…bitch."

I was seriously thinking about sneaking out the door and waiting in my car for ten more minutes and then coming in again. I'd walked in just in time to catch the end of an extremely heated conversation Mr. Sol was having with some girl.

He turned around and threw his phone at the wall. Only…I happened to be standing right there. And it was too early in the morning to have the proper reflexes to, you know, duck.

A cheap phone to the head sure woke a person up. "What the hell is your problem?"

"Oh Jesus!"

"More like your innocent student who just got mauled by your phone." I rubbed my forehead. There was definitely going to be a bruise there. That would be a fun one to explain.

"Bianca…I am so sorry…I didn't see you there, and I was on the phone with-" he started frantically apologizing.

"A bitch named Daphne." I bent down and grabbed his phone. He seemed ready to give me his whole sob story. Just kill me now. "And to be honest, that's more than I want to know. Now I'm going to go try and fix my face and pretend this never happened. Deal?" I held out his phone to him.

He grabbed it, obviously embarrassed. "You sure you're okay?"

"Never been better."

"You have bobby pins?"

"…yeah?"

"Come in my office. I can help you out."

So this temporary lapse in judgment hadn't seemed so bad. We were sitting across from each other on the piano bench in his office, and he was trying to pin my hair so I had pseudo bangs for the day. There wasn't a mirror in sight, but he seemed to know what he was doing.

Which led me to ask, "Umm…where exactly did you learn to do this?"

"I went to school to be a beautician before deciding I wanted to be a music teacher," he said. I stared at him, my mouth open. "No, really I just grew up with my mom and sister. You pick up a few things…you know…without a dad."

Sore spot? It sucked for him, but I really didn't want anyone else's problems to deal with. I had a brother whose only friend was a gay kid who wanted to stay in the closet and a dad who suddenly never wanted to be home and I needed to figure out-

"Aladdin. I mean, if you just thought about it, you could wish the rules about your wishes were gone. And then you could have everything you want!" I heard Silena's obnoxiously high voice enter the room. Damn soprano.

"I disagree. Beauty and the Beast is way less realistic, even before you factor in the dancing furniture," Becky Nakamura responded.

"Is Anastasia a Disney movie?" Grover asked.

Sometimes I wondered where they came up with their strange conversations.

One of the guys joined in, going on about how no guy in real life would want Mulan if she could pass for a man.

"Just follow my lead. You look totally normal," Mr. Sol promised. He walked out of his office like nothing had happened. "The Little Mermaid. Oh, I don't have my voice anymore? I'll just pull out my phone blog about it."

"What were you guys doing?" Silena asked as soon as I walked out.

"Nothing." Mr. Sol answered.

Really smooth. This awkward silence hung in the air. "My solo. _Nothing_. From A Chorus Line?"

Apparently no one really cared, because they all went back to their stupid conversation.

"I'm really sorry," Mr. Sol whispered as he brushed past me. "It's been a bad morning."

No shit, Sherlock.

* * *

The only thing worse than substitute teachers were the creepy substitute teachers with dreadlocks and more piercings than you could count on your fingers – the ones who wouldn't quit staring at you.

Our real English teacher had gotten pregnant, or had a nervous breakdown, or had meningitis, or maybe some strange combination of the three. No one really knew. All we'd been told was that she was out for the rest of the semester, and we were stuck with a sub.

"Mrs. M?" Grover groaned as we walked in. "Listen to me, Percy. She's crazy. Like certifiably."

The aforementioned dreadlocked teacher was sitting at our old teacher's desk, listening to John Mayer on her iPod at an excessively loud volume, and wearing sunglasses even though we were inside...while it was raining. She was definitely in her own little world.

"M?"

"That's what we call her. Her name is Mrs. Medacrzandrembrckza…I think," Grover said, enunciating the last name very slowly. "It's German or something."

You know the feeling you get when someone's watching you? Yeah, I was getting it really bad. I threw my stuff on my desk. "Don't look, but she's watching you," Grover whispered.

I turned my head. As much as you could tell with someone wearing giant sunglasses, she was definitely staring.

Grover grabbed my arm and jerked me back around. "I told you not to look!"

"Yeah, well it's the first thing you want to do when someone says that!"

Other people started walking in. Grover wandered over to his spot at the other side of the room, and I slid in my desk. We'd hung out a lot after Thanksgiving break (I could not take being in my house after finding out my mom was pregnant), but had the understanding that we didn't hang out when other people were around.

"Big meet tonight," one of the swimmer guys said, clapping me on the back. "Try not to screw it up this time."

No pressure or anything.

Mrs. M slowly turned her iPod off and wrapped the headphones around it just so. People quit talking as soon as she stood up and walked to the front of the classroom. She was definitely a creepy sub by definition.

"Hello, students." She hissed the s on students to the point where she sounded part snake. "Your teacher left me a…guide of what she'd like us to do during our time together, but I think there are much better things we can do."

She started walking through the rows of desks. "We are going to start with a research paper." She lingered at my desk for a few seconds too long. I was scared that grease from her dreadlocks would get all over my stuff.

"Hon, I haven't seen you here before."

This was awkward. "I'm new."

"Who are your parents?"

Even worse. I hated when teachers asked that question, especially in front of an entire class. "Sally Ugliano is my mom."

Any teacher with a hint of decency would have left it at that. And any student with a hint of a brain could figure out the rest of the story without me saying it.

That's when I decided not to be the guy who doesn't know his dad with the gold digger mom. Because trust me, I knew what that was like from boarding school experience, and it either made people pity you or think you were the biggest loser on the planet.

"My dad died when I was five. Car crash," I lied.

Apparently that was normal. I guess I should have figured, since the new girl in the junior class was here since her mom had died the same way. Maybe this school even had a support group for them. Anything was possible – the hippie school I went to had a club for people who were famous in their past lives.

"Oh." She seemed disappointed. Incredibly weird. "Now, as I was saying. We're going to do a research paper. Ten pages. Come to class tomorrow with a topic, and have your research done by Friday."

That was a grand total of three days. Times like these made me wish I'd let my mom put me in the special ed English program – this project was nearly impossible for me with my dyslexia thrown in.

Mrs. M clapped her hands together. "Any questions? No? Well then, I think we're going to have a great time together." She smiled, showing off less-than-perfect teeth.

And I could have sworn she was staring right at me.


	17. Everyone Loves Surprises

**Chapter Seventeen  
****Everyone Loves Surprises**

I should have gone to some free clinic in the middle of nowhere and used a fake name just for good measure. Instead, I chose to go to go Open Hearts in Degis, the largest and busiest hospital in a 500 mile radius. It was the second largest hospital in the state, was known for its oncology program, and had an entire children's hospital.

It was also where my mom used to work. Not like it mattered, or that I'd even thought about it on the 45 minute drive over.

I'd called the hospital as soon as I got home from Thanksgiving break at my grandfather's insistence. He'd promised not to tell Nell as long as I kept him updated on what I did about…it. I was too thankful to even think about how irresponsible of a parent he'd probably been.

Things had started to go bad when the receptionist recognized me. "Hey, Thalia girl. How's your mom been?" the lady said as I handed over my insurance card.

"Oh, you know. She's not too lively these days." I felt like Mrs. White from Clue. The movie, not the stupid board game.

The lady hit a few keys on the keyboard. "I didn't know you were expecting."

"I kind of…haven't told people yet, so you know."

She nodded. "Oh, I understand. Don't worry about it. Just take a seat and Doctor Zatari will be with you in a few minutes."

Zatari? That sounded American.

I hoped Luke's mom didn't work in this unit. I suppose in the worst case scenario that I saw her, I could make up some excuse about coming in to get tested for…something. Because that would go over so much better.

The magazines were all baby-themed. I decided it was better to wait without any reading material than risk seeing a graphic article about breastfeeding.

"Is this your first pregnancy?"

Oh. My. Fucking. God. The waiting room of the obstetrics department was the last place I wanted to make friends. "Yeah," I muttered under my breath. Maybe she'd stop.

"I was about your age when I had my first," the woman said. She was kind of pretty and didn't look like she was older than 35. "He's a freshman now. I'm Sally Jacks…Ugliano, by the way."

I wondered if she was always so open with people, or if it was just a pregnancy hormones thing. I hoped someone would shoot me if I got like that.

"I'm 17." The lady didn't say anything. "This is the part where you're supposed to tell me how having a baby ruined your life and I should really consider giving it away or, you know, just nipping it in the bud and-"

"Thalia Grace?" an overweight nurse called out.

As I walked over to her, I wished the ground would open up and swallow me whole. Anything would have been better than this.

"So…you're 17," the nurse said as she led me down a narrow hallway covered with baby pictures. She didn't do a very good job of hiding her disdain. I wished I had a stepmom who owned a nail salon and smelled like methacrylate to defend my honor.

Hollywood definitely glamorized teen pregnancy.

"We just need to get your height and weight." She didn't seem like the type that was very happy with her life. "5'10…140 pounds," she muttered, writing on her clipboard. "Okay, follow me."

The nurse more or less dumped me in a room and left. There were pictures on the walls of ultrasounds at various weeks and a poster describing the different drugs you could get during labor. It was ten times worse than the waiting room.

Doctor Zatari came in a good half hour later. "There was an emergency with another woman," she said breezily, looking at the clipboard the nurse had left. "I apologize for the wait. And it seems like your nurse forgot to ask you a few of the background questions."

Go figure.

"First day of your last period?" She had this really soothing voice. I suppose you needed it when women in labor were constantly screaming at you about how they didn't want to rank their pain on a scale of one to ten and just needed a fucking epidural.

"Umm…October 15."

"So you're right at eight weeks. Any symptoms yet?"

A better question would be which ones I hadn't had yet. "Yeah, umm..lots of motion sickness. Mood swings…I've, like…grown a cup size, and-"

"Thalia?" she interrupted me. "I know you're 17, and this probably isn't something you want or planned for…but you don't need to be embarrassed here, okay? I'm here to help you get through your pregnancy and deliver a beautiful healthy baby at the end of this, if that's what you want."

Her speech was very moving and all, but all I could think of was how many times she probably gave it in a day. "I don't…know if that's, you know, what I want."

Doctor Zatari didn't miss a beat. She grabbed a few pamphlets and handed them to me. "Well, there are other options. Our department works with an adoption agency to help match mothers with potential parents who are unable to-"

"What about…the other option?"

"Well." She folded her hands in her lap. "We do the procedure here up to ten weeks. There are other places that will do it further along, but it gets…difficult."

I didn't like the way that sounded. "Okay, well I'm just going to think that one over."

Doctor Zatari nodded. "Some of these questions don't exactly fit your situation, but I have to ask. Okay, Thalia?"

Twenty minutes later I'd been grilled about all the details of my menstrual cycle, gone over all my symptoms, been asked if this was my first pregnancy and if I was a drinker or a smoker, and worked through a complex family medical history. I didn't know how to discreetly explain that I didn't know my dad, my mom was dead, and my boyfriend didn't know about all this, so I couldn't text him and ask if anyone in his family had ever been diagnosed with a genetic disorder.

"We're running really far behind today, Thalia. I apologize. Can I schedule you to come back in a few weeks so we can run some tests and talk more about your plans for this pregnancy?"

"Yeah. That would be good."

"And maybe someone from your family could come with you…or the father of your baby? Just so we can get a better medical history."

"Maybe. I'll see."

I'd think about it when hell froze over.

* * *

Silena hadn't been able to shut up about how in love she was when she'd gotten her first boyfriend. It'd been like I was in their relationship – that's how much she had to tell me. It was surprising that the world kept spinning when they broke up two weeks later.

So what if that'd been in fifth grade? I thought she would let me have my moment when the time came.

I was giving her all the details before The Bachelor started. "Chris gave me a ride home from practice last night and asked if I wanted to do something this weekend. And today during school he-"

Silena rolled her eyes. "Clarisse, are you listening to yourself when you talk? You sound…desperate. Obsessed. Clingy. He's not going to want you if you don't play just a little hard to get."

I wanted to tell her to take a look in the mirror. "We were talking about Luke and Thalia last night."

She immediately perked up. "What did he say? Does he hate her?"

"I don't know. You sound kind of, what's the word I'm looking for? Desperate. Maybe obsessed, even." She glared at me. "He thinks Luke's doomed to be one of those people who never gets out of the small town trap and Thalia will break up with him sometime between now and when he flunks out of high school."

"That's harsh." Silena frowned.

"Chris doesn't exactly sugarcoat things."

We sat there in awkward silence. The awkward commercial break in between shows wasn't even close to done. This was weird – normally we had way too much to talk about.

My phone beeped. "Who is it?" Silena asked, sounding only halfheartedly curious.

"Chris."

_I need to tell u something._

_What?_ I texted back, my fingers shaking.

A few seconds later: _I don't date during basketball season._

_Then what have we been doing?_

_I don't know. Sorry. We can still be friends, right?_

I threw my phone to the ground.

"Trouble in paradise?" Silena asked haughtily.

I glared at her. "Shut up. I'm going home."

She rolled her eyes. "Whatever. You'll be over it by tomorrow."

Only people like her could say that and really believe it could happen.

* * *

I had a perfectly good laptop and speedy wireless connection at home, but people at the library didn't ask a million questions about how your day had gone, if you were ever going to invite any friends over, and why you had to be so difficult.

Some people didn't know where to start on a ten-page paper. I'd been able to write one easily in seventh grade. I could go from researching to final draft in less than four hours, not to brag.

I was in my element, researching my topic and creating my organizer.

Until I remembered why I didn't like going to the library's media center. All the freaky gamers and Facebook addicts used it religiously. They didn't exactly create an environment that was great for academia.

But the person who ended up taking the computer next to me was worse. Much worse.

Percy Jackson.

Why did life keep throwing him in my direction?

"Working on your English paper?" he asked nervously. I looked over at his computer screen. He'd Googled "high school essay ideas."

"Yeah."

"What's your topic?"

I held up one of the sites I'd printed off. "Who's ad Civin?" he asked.

"da Vinci." I tried not to roll my eyes. "Wait…you're dyslexic?"

His face turned red and he looked back at his computer screen. "Yeah," he muttered and clicked on one website that claimed it had 50 topics that would be sure to get you an A.

I felt kind of bad for him. "I'm dyslexic, too," I admitted.

He stared at me. "I know you feel bad for me, because it's really bad when you're 14 and still can't read right, but you don't have to lie to try and make me feel better."

"No, really. I'm serious."

Percy shrugged and went back to looking for a topic. A few minutes later he asked, "So can I ask why you're picking to do a paper on some dead artist guy?"

Again, I tried not to roll my eyes. "He wasn't just an artist. He was an inventor, an architect, a musician…it'd be really easy to write ten pages about him." That was putting it in terms he would understand.

"So does that mean how to plan a surprise birthday party wouldn't be a good topic?" he asked, reading off his screen.

I couldn't tell if he was serious or not. "Well, I guess it depends on how elaborate of a party you're going to have."

He grinned and started laughing. "Annabeth, you know I'm joking, right?"

"Yeah, I knew that, but, um, you're a swimmer…so maybe you could do your paper about…?" I left the thought hanging.

"Water?" He laughed again. "I'll keep looking."

I went back to making my outline. Next, I'd make my works cited. Then I'd start writing. I'd easily be done with this project by the time everyone else was finishing up their research.

I looked over at Percy's screen. I swear I was just curious to see what topic he'd finally come up with. Only, he wasn't looking for a topic anymore. He was on Facebook, talking with two guys from the swim team.

I should have just kept my mouth shut, but I couldn't stop myself. "You know your research needs to be done on Friday, right?"

"Yeah, I was just…taking a break," he defended himself. "And I picked my topic."

"Which is?"

"The…ummm…history of…the very rare…thing…that's…"

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever. You're obviously Mrs. M's favorite, so she'll probably let you get away with not being done on Friday."

"I'll be done on Friday!"

"Whatever." I unplugged my USB and grabbed the stuff I'd printed off. "We'll see."


	18. Chain Reaction

**Chapter Eighteen  
****Chain Reaction**

At my old schools, the current events section at the beginning of social studies had been meant to kill time because the teacher hadn't made a lesson plan and was winging it. But the plan always backfired, because none of us watched the news, read the paper, or listened to the radio. Really, did teachers not understand that?

But apparently small towns were different, because when Mr. Brunner asked my class for current events, just about every student raised their hand…except me.

"Senator King is becoming the ambassador of Greece as soon as his term is done," one of the girls said when Mr. Brunner called on her. And just like that, all the hands in the room went down.

Okay, so maybe everyone just went to CNN and skimmed the first article they saw. That sounded a lot more normal.

Mr. Brunner nodded. "Can you tell us who Senator King is, Percy?"

I hated when teachers did that – the whole calling on the one person who didn't know the answer thing. I looked down at my desk. "No."

He seemed disappointed, like I was supposed to know this stuff, even though I knew next to nothing about government. "Anyone want to explain?"

A perky brunette raised her hand. "Junius King went to Shallow Lake High. He went on to attend college in Degis, but dropped out when his dad died – leaving him as their heir to Lightning Electric. Then he-"

"Very good, Rebecca," Mr. Brunner stopped her. "But I'm sure Percy doesn't know what Lightning Electric is either." I did not like being singled out. It was making me feel like the 3rd grader who still couldn't get through the ABCs without stumbling.

"It's like, the biggest electric company in the state," one of the Stoll brothers started. I never knew which one was which – and it seemed like no one else did, since teachers and students used their names interchangeably. "The main branch is in Shallow Lake, where it was first founded like…500 years ago."

"Yeah, and Senator King was like…20 and he became the owner and CEO and all that business stuff," another guy piped in. "He did that for a few years, and then became the town mayor on top of everything."

I wondered what the mayor of a town with a population of less than a thousand did that made him so special.

"Then there was this big fancy lawsuit thing he did so that he could leave the town and become governor, but the business was kept in the family even though a board of investors technically got ownership of it," Becky Nakamura said. "He was Michigan's youngest governor ever."

"And he became a senator as soon as he turned 30," Annabeth finished. "President Obama appointed him to be ambassador to Greece as soon as his term finishes in a few weeks, and last night during his press conference he announced that he one day wants to run for president."

I felt like this story was missing a lot of impact because I hadn't grown up in Shallow Lake and didn't understand the complex social structure that preexisted.

This was apparently a pretty big occasion, though. We spent the rest of the hour talking about Shallow Lake's history, from clusters of farmers to a bunch of people who lived here only because their parents had and worked in the larger neighboring towns.

The good thing about Mr. Brunner was that he made class go really fast. It didn't seem too long before the bell rang and everyone was running to their next class. Except for me.

"Percy, can I talk to you?" Mr. Brunner asked. "It's okay, I'll write you a pass to your next class."

For a second I considered sprinting out the door. He was in a wheelchair; he'd never be able to catch me. Then I felt really bad for thinking like that – I really did like him as a teacher.

I walked up to his desk. "Yeah?"

"I know this doesn't make sense to you, but you need to know it. It's more important for you than any other student here." He was giving me this dead serious look. "When the time is right, you'll find out the rest of the story."

"Yeah, ummm, okay." I just wanted him to write the pass so I could get to my next class.

"Just be careful," he warned me. "Your mother doesn't know how big of a risk she took by bringing you here."

My mom? I think she would have told me if I was in danger or whatever. Pregnancy hormones were really making her more open about things. Like, on the way to school last week she'd gone on about this crazy dream she'd had about drowning in the ocean until she realized the water was only three feet deep and she could stand up.

I had just smiled and nodded. That's what I did most of the time when she started talking away. But when she'd pulled out in front of the school, she'd asked me a question.

"What's the girl with the dark hair like?"

I assumed she was talking about the junior girl with the dead mom who was slowly making her away up the steps. "I don't really know her. She's dating this guy who got suspended, and her mom died in October."

Mom seemed strangely affected by it all. "Wait, why do you care?" I asked her.

She shrugged. I just kept looking at her. "She was there when I went to see my OB/GYN."

Okay, that was one thing I wish she hadn't shared. "Like, a pregnancy doctor?"

"Oh, Percy. Just pretend I didn't tell you that. Have a great day!"

I wished I could. But today in health we were continuing our unit on pregnancy.

* * *

We'd had a substitute teacher in health today. This one didn't have a creepy obsession with Percy Jackson – thank God. But he was also a guy, so that would have taken the weirdness to a whole new level.

We'd been given a worksheet on the emotions people feel during pregnancy, and the sub said to study for the test we were taking tomorrow.

So essentially I sat there studying while everyone else talked about who was dating who, what had happened on The Bachelor last week, and what was for lunch. It was really hard to focus, and when I was distracted, my dyslexia acted up.

"What do you think of Thalia and Luke? They've been together for, like…a month and a half," Lea said a little too loudly. "They're on the fast track to becoming the school's new power couple."

Another girl rolled her eyes. "The power couple thing is overrated. Our school hasn't had one since Lee and Katie broke up in August because he was checking out her sister."

"I don't get it. They're identical twins," one of the Stoll brothers chimed in. "They look and act exactly the same. I don't get how people tell who's who."

"Did they really hook up at the Halloween party?" one of the guys asked.

"Katie and Lee?"

"No, Thalia and Luke."

"Oh, yeah. They definitely did."

"I heard she was gone from school a few weeks ago because she was getting tested for…you know."

That was when Percy Jackson joined the conversation. "That's what an OB\GYN does?"

"No…they do, like, pregnancy stuff. Why?"

Yeah, I was definitely wondering where he'd been going with his comment. "Because…uhh…my mom kind of saw her when she was going there for her first checkup… cause you know…she's pregnant," he muttered.

"Are you saying Thalia's pregnant?"

"I didn't say that."

A plan immediately formed itself in my head. As soon as the bell rang, I sprinted to the hall where I knew his locker was, hoping that she wouldn't be there.

"Annabeth?" Luke raised an eyebrow. "What's wrong?"

The words caught in my throat. How dumb would I look if this ended up being a stupid rumor? But what if it wasn't? I mean, didn't he deserve to know?

At least, that was how I justified it to myself.

"Okay, you're not going to say anything and I really have to get to my next-"

"People are saying Thalia's pregnant."

* * *

We had a 15 minute break in between 6th and 7th hour. Personally, I would rather have done without it and been out of school 15 minutes sooner, but some days it was…eventful. Almost worthwhile.

The entire high school was basically one long hallway, and the different classes had their lockers on the four corners. Most people took their break in the gym, but there were always a handful of people who stuck around and gossiped or worked on homework.

I was trying to read through the next chapter of my AP English book, but apparently it wasn't meant to be.

"What the hell?" a girl shrieked.

"I could ask you the same thing," a guy, presumably her boyfriend, responded.

Maybe they'd have the decency to talk a little quieter. Or, you know, realize no one cared and go somewhere else.

"I got it taken care of."

Just focus, Bianca. You can ignore them.

"I didn't even know till ten minutes ago, and you just decided to get an abortion?"

I contemplated standing up and telling them to beat it. But…I kind of wanted to see where this was going.

"You don't want a baby. I don't want to have a baby with you. Face it; you'd suck as a dad."

The art of interpreting a short story could wait. This was getting interesting.

"So you were just never going to tell me?" Luke. The guy I'd blamed for my party. I hadn't realized he'd get suspended for so long – I suppose I should have felt kind of bad, but blaming him had saved my ass.

"Nope." Thalia, the new girl with the dead mom, was sounding pretty confident, considering how pissed off her boyfriend looked.

"And what if I wanted to keep it?" Which he didn't; he was just pissed, even though he probably would have done the same thing. This was better than Days of Our Lives. Wait, hadn't her mom been on that show?

She sighed. "Let me try to get this through your head. People don't think it's all fun and cute when their little Junebug gets pregnant. And the real life Mollies of the world? They don't get a James who's willing to step in and play daddy. They get stuck with assholes like Albert."

He was speechless for a moment. Maybe because the movies she'd just referenced were huge chick flicks. Or at least my brother hadn't wanted to watch them with me when we'd gotten them from Netflix.

"So that's what you think of me. Bitch."

She slapped him and started storming down the hallway. "Yes! That is what I think of you, because you know what? I can't stand you…at all!" she shouted over her shoulder as her boyfriend…well, more like ex-boyfriend, just stood there in shock.

I know I should have felt bad for witnessing this young love being ripped apart and all, but all I could think of was how if I were the type to have friends…stretching it even further, if I were the type to have a best friend, it would definitely be Thalia Grace.

That girl made being a bitch look glamorous.

I loved it.


	19. She Senses Something Call it Desperation

**Chapter Nineteen  
****She Senses Something, Call It Desperation**

16 and Pregnant was on MTV. Knocked Up was on TNT followed by Juno. And on Cake Boss, the guy's wife was going in for her ultrasound.

Life seemed to know exactly what buttons to push sometimes.

I settled on Gilmore Girls, but honesty, their references made less sense to me than….Thalia's, and I ended up going to my room to grab the pack of cigarettes I kept hidden under my mattress. Like I said, stress always brought me back to the habit.

A few hours later, my stress relief session was interrupted by someone ringing the doorbell over and over again. If my mom had lost her key to the house or something stupid, I swore I would kill her. Without bothering to put the cigarette out, I went and got the door.

"Package for you." It was the damn UPS guy. He handed me a small box addressed to my mom. "You really shouldn't smoke. It's not good for you."

"Yeah? I'm stressed."

He frowned. "It's a Friday night."

"And?"

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you have a girlfriend or something?"

I felt like taking that package with the bright red fragile sticker and kicking it down ten flights of stairs. "No," I said flatly.

"You look like you need fresh air and someone to talk to."

Yeah, why not go for a walk with a complete stranger? Things couldn't get any worse. I threw the package inside and stepped out the door. He immediately took off, and I found myself struggling to keep up.

"So tell me what happened with the girl," he said, plucking the cigarette out of my hand and stomping it on the ground.

So he wasn't one who was much for small talk. I guess I could handle that. "She was pregnant and decided to get an abortion."

"And the emotional stress broke you two apart?" His phone started ringing. He pulled it out of his pocket, glanced at the screen, and silenced it with a sigh.

"No. She didn't tell me about it."

"So you wanted her to keep the baby?"

It felt weird when he put it like that...a lot more…real. "Yeah…well, no…but, it's that…"

"You know, it's easy to say yes when the answer is already no," he said. It was hard to tell because I didn't really know him, but I was willing to bet he was speaking from experience. He shook his head. "Listen, you're in high school. I'm sure you didn't want this to happen."

"She could have at least told me."

"But she didn't. And it's done. Now you can choose to sit around moping about it or move on with your life, with or without her." Again, I was getting the feeling that this came from experience.

"What about-"

"No."

"But there's-"

"No excuses."

"Aren't you supposed to-"

"Nope. Just do what I do and forget about it. Now that everything's happened, there's nothing you can do anymore."

"So you're saying I'm just supposed to forget everything?"

He shrugged. "If it's what helps you."

I wondered if he had kids, and if so, just how terrible of a dad he was.

* * *

It was funny how everyone would openly stare at you one day, but the next they would only whisper and look at you behind your back. It had happened to me enough that it was weird having it happen to someone else.

People were talking about Thalia and Luke every chance they got. Everyone claimed to have seen this coming, but they were all so amazed when it finally did. Well, the baby thing threw in a loop, but really.

When I tried explaining it all to Clarisse, she just glared at me. Like, literally glared. "You're just mad that someone else is getting all the attention." She was still sore about Chris shooting her down, but was pretending not to care.

Thalia had been acting unaffected. Luke was a different story. He was walking around like a cute little lost puppy that'd just been left at the side of the road. It made me feel terrible for him – I hadn't been there for the breakup, but a few different people had told me what happened, and it sounded…bad.

"Yeah Silena, she was all like, going on about how annoying he was and how she couldn't stand him and would rather become a nun than be the mother of his children, and-" Katie Gardner gushed.

"No, it was more like shouting, shouting, shouting and then something about a girl named Molly. Whatever that means." Her twin sister, Charlie, corrected.

I tried not to roll my eyes. I loved Katie and Charlie, but the two of them together was way too much. Especially when you just wanted a straight answer.

"And then she just ran off. And he was just standing there, like a…hmmm…like…"

"Like John when he found out Savannah was getting married to the old guy!"

"Oh, I love that movie. It's on Starz tonight."

"But it's so sad when the dad dies and he's the only one there. It almost makes me cry worse than The Notebook."

As much as I loved listening to them talk about Dear John, my twin tolerance was at its end. "Well, thanks ladies, but I have to go now." I grabbed my English book and slammed my locker shut. "That English sub is such a Nazi. Won't ever let me show up late like the old one."

I don't think they heard me, since they kept going on about Channing Tatum and Ryan Gosling. The really bad thing about those two was they made anyone who hung out with them feel like the third wheel. No wonder they were both single.

Students were slowly making their way to their next classes – everyone knew which teachers wanted you there right away and the teachers who didn't care as long as you showed up eventually, so most people planned their timing accordingly.

Luke was standing in front of his open locker, slowly pulling out his stuff for his next class. Even though all the girls secretly crushed on him and the guys envied him for it, he didn't have any real friends. He gave off kind of a loner vibe, but I felt bad for him.

"Hey," I brushed his arm lightly as I walked by. "It's gonna be okay."

He stared at me blankly, like he hadn't been able to understand what I'd just said. "I'm trying not to think about it," he finally said, smiling weakly. "What's done is done, right?"

If that was his coping strategy, it obviously wasn't working well.

"You don't have anything to feel guilty about."

He shrugged. "Again, trying not to think about it."

An idea formed itself in my mind. "You know, if you're trying not to think about anything with…her, then the best thing to do is to find someone else to focus on. It helps you and pisses her off. Total win-win situation."

"Sure."

Well, that wasn't the reaction I was going for. "I don't know if you're that lovesick or what, but this is the part where you're supposed to ask the girl right in front of you if she'll be your girlfriend." This was going to be a lot of work.

"Okay, Silena. Will you be my girlfriend?" He had the same tone of voice that you used when you were humoring a little kid. Not exactly the biggest turn-on in the world.

"Yeah, I don't think so." I kept walking towards my English class that I was for sure going to be late for. The teacher hated me anyway just because I suggested she should try a different shampoo. Seriously, her dreadlocks looked like a bunch of little snakes hanging off her head.

He caught my wrist after a few seconds. "Silena, I'm sorry. I would love it if you would be my girlfriend."

Something was off about him, but I guessed that was about as good as it was going to get from him right about now. "Good," I said, turning around to face him. "Now that that's settled, you should-"

He kissed me before I could get the whole sentence out. Okay, so we'd have to work on his listening skills, but that could wait. I was pretty sure our school had some PDA law that outlawed stuff like this, but I'd been waiting for months. A girl had needs.

"Well, I really need to get to English now." There were traces of my lip gloss on his lips. "Now that you've made me very, very late." I giggled. Pretty soon everyone would know that we were going out. Life was perfect.

"Yeah, okay." He wasn't looking at me. I followed his gaze down the hall to a girl standing by her locker, eyes on the ground like she'd been caught looking.

Three guesses who.

It looked like we had a lot more work to do than I thought.

* * *

The only thing worse than puking was puking in a school bathroom. I thought my days of not being able to keep anything down were gone, but the image of my ex-boyfriend with his tongue down some other girl's throat was enough to bring it back.

I thought it was safe to say life couldn't get any worse until I walked out of the stall and someone was there washing their hands. I'd completely missed them when I'd run in. I thought she was Bianca di Angelo, but there were a lot of people I didn't remember after being gone for so long.

"Luke and Silena? You know he did that just because you were watching," she said. I pretended not to hear.

I knew he'd done it just to make me mad. He'd looked right at me before turning around and kissing her. And afterwards, he gave me this look, like _see how much I don't care about you?_

Oh God. The thought made me sick all over again. I barely made it back to the toilet before puking again. I prayed Bianca, or whoever she was, would be gone when I came back out.

Nope. Still there, waiting for me with a wet paper towel. I grabbed it from her and wiped my face off. This took embarrassing to a whole new level.

"I know you'd rather see him hit by a bus than making out with the school slut, but…you know. Sometimes you step in a giant pile of shit. It happens."

"Well thank you, Forrest Gump."

She rolled her eyes, but then her face softened. "Are you gonna be okay?"

I crossed my arms. "Do you want the real answer or the one that's going to let you off the hook so you can go on to your next class without having to worry about me?"

"You pretty much just told me you're not."

"No shit, Sherlock. I lied to my boyfriend, who then broke up with me, and a week later he's moved on."

You know those moments where you wish you could hit rewind and go back and change what you just said?

"What did you lie about? You really weren't pregnant?"

This was one of them.

"No."

She sighed. "Look, I'm just like you. I'm a bitch with no friends whatsoever, so I assure you, if you tell me, no one else is going to find out."

I kept my mouth shut.

"Whatever. I tried." She started heading for the door.

"Bianca!" I yelled her name just a little too loudly, and it echoed in the bathroom for a few seconds.

She turned around and raised an eyebrow. "Yeah?"

"I freaked out when he asked me if I was pregnant…so I lied and said I got it taken care of. But…"

"But?"

"I didn't get an abortion. I'm still pregnant."


	20. Lying Is The Most Fun A Girl Can Have

**Chapter Twenty  
****Lying Is The Most Fun a Girl Can Have…**

"I didn't get an abortion. I'm still pregnant."

Oh shit. This was why I didn't like playing Mother Teresa. People had a way of dumping stuff on you and just expecting you to know how to handle it. And honestly, I was terrible at the whole shoulder to cry on thing.

"And you're planning on…staying pregnant?"

She slumped down against the wall and put her hands on her stomach. "I don't know. I guess so."

I sat down next to her. "This probably isn't what you want to think about right now, but eventually…it's going to become a little more obvious that you're pregnant. And then Luke is going to find out." Told you I was bad at the sympathy thing.

"I'm not due until the end of July. I was thinking I could get through the rest of the year and then spend the summer with my grandpa in Florida or my aunt in France."

"And then you come back with a baby that just fell from the sky. Yeah, people will really believe you."

"I haven't thought that far ahead yet, okay?" She brought her knees up to her chest. "I'm trying to take this one day at a time."

This wasn't the confident bitch I'd seen in the hallway the other day. This was a scared girl who looked like she had the weight of the world on her shoulders.

I couldn't help it – my mom instinct kicked in.

"Hey, it's okay."

She glared at me, then broke down crying. "It's not okay. Everything has gone to hell, and I have no one to help me, and I don't want to do this…"

"It's okay."

"Are you…just gonna…keep saying that until I believe you?" she choked out in between bursts of tears.

Our home ec class about parents and children did not even come close to preparing a person for this kind of thing. "I guess I don't know what else to say."

"Yeah, well, me neither." She wiped her eyes and stood up.

"You better figure it out."

"Thanks, Mom." She was pretty good at turning the ice princess act back on.

But that was all it was. An act.

"My last hour is just a study hall. Want to leave early with me? You could stay at my house for a while. Easy A is on Starz tonight, and my dad is out of town because there was a funeral somewhere, and-"

"Sure. It's not like things can get any worse."

The faintest smile formed on her lips. Between two bitchy misunderstood girls, it was the equivalent of a giant hug and thank you.

* * *

Of course we were playing a basketball game two hours away in Prairie North when a freak blizzard blew in.

Of course the idiot referees didn't call off the game and let us go home, because apparently it was too much trouble to reschedule.

Of course the boys' team happened to be playing Prairie South, so they were stuck right along with us.

The coaches were at a loss for what to do. No parents had come to the game, since Shallow Lake's annual chili feed happened to be tonight. In other words, there were no parents to dump kids on. They were stuck with 50 tired, sweaty, hungry teenagers.

Prairie was a pretty big city – hence the having two separate schools. After calling quite a few athletic boosters, probably making sure this would all be paid for, we found ourselves at some dingy hotel a few miles away from the school.

"Listen up!" The boy's coach, also the gym teacher, shouted. If his voice was a font, it would be permanently stuck on caps lock. "Apparently it's too unsafe to take you home tonight, so we're stuck here until tomorrow. Your parents have all been called, and they are aware."

We'd had to fill out a packet of permission slips and wavers that weighed at least ten pounds when we visited the electric plant in middle school. I wondered how they were getting away with this.

"Lights out at 11. We're taping your doors, so don't get any ideas. Be on the bus tomorrow at eight. Now shut up while Ms. Peterrs reads your room assignments."

"Fredricks, Gardner, Gardner, and La Rue. You're in room 107."

Oh, things just didn't get any better. The damn perky Gardner twins bounced up to the coach and grabbed our room cards. I, on the other hand, slowly grabbed my bag and made my way through the crowd.

"Hey, La Rue. Heard you led the team tonight. Nice job." Chris congratulated me as I walked by. As if he thought I needed his approval. I was the only sophomore who made varsity – it was obvious that I was good.

"Yeah? And you guys pulled that win out of your asses."

"Stoll got hurt in the second quarter."

"Better hope that doesn't happen at regionals." I brushed past him.

Katie and Charlie had already taken over the entire room, while the freshman girl we'd been stuck with sat quietly in the corner on her phone. Clothes were everywhere. Some Lady Gaga song was playing from the iPod they'd plugged into a dock.

How did they fit all that shit into their gym bags?

I wasn't sure why they went out for basketball. Girly girls usually did volleyball, cross country, and track. And to be honest, neither of them was that good. They were doomed to be the pathetic seniors who still played on JV.

"Hi, Clarisse," one of the twins said, smiling. She'd already changed into her pajamas and was braiding her sister's hair.

"Do you and Chris have a thing?" Twin B blurted out, giggling.

"Charlie! I thought we agreed to be subtle about asking her."

I don't think they knew the meaning of the word subtle. "No, we don't. I can't stand him."

"Oh, well, you guys would be a mega-cute couple. Like, the Mexican couple of the century," Charlie gushed.

"I'm half Puerto Rican." Not like either of them knew the difference. My dad had met my mom when he was stationed in Puerto Rico, one thing led to another, and now we were living in Shallow Lake while he did a tour in Afghanistan.

"Well, we think you two would be amazing together. Did you hear Luke and Silena got together right before eighth hour?" Katie said, the first half directed at me and the second towards her sister. "I'm sorry, but that's just skanky on her part.

"She's just a rebound. I give it three weeks."

"You gave Thalia and Luke three weeks."

Charlie giggled. "Yeah, I guess I did. So, did you see how cute Travis looked tonight with his leg all wrapped up?"

"Oh, yes! But you know, I think Connor's a lot cuter."

It was going to be a long, long night.

* * *

"If you died tomorrow, what song would you want played at your funeral?" Nico asked.

This was what happened when you were snowed in with no electricity. No one had known a huge blizzard was coming, so my parents had been fine with me spending the night at "Percy's house." Bianca had also brought a friend home – something I didn't know she had, no offense to her.

"Thalia, Grover and Nico. You're pregnant, they're gay," she'd announced, clapping her hands. "Okay, now everything's out in the open." Nico had glared at her. I guess everything was okay as long as we knew something about Thalia, too.

So, we'd all been watching Easy A when the snow started coming in. By the end of the movie, it was too bad outside to leave, so apparently Thalia was also spending the night.

Starz must have been having a letters theme, because the next movie on was John Q. Before he'd even hijacked the hospital, the power went out. Like, completely out.

Bianca ran downstairs and found a bunch of candles her dad used to decorate for wakes. Pretty soon the entire room was lit up.

"This is the perfect setting to use a Ouija board. Think there's any spirits that want to talk to us?" Nico asked eagerly.

Bianca shot him a look. "Nico!"

Thalia shook her head. She'd been really quiet all night. "It's okay. But, I really don't want to know what my mom has to say to her stupid daughter."

We'd ended up playing the question game…for two hours, and it was to the point where we were starting to run out of things to ask.

"What song would you want played at your funeral if you died tomorrow?" Nico asked.

"Hair by Lady Gaga," Bianca said immediately.

"Only the Good Die Young?" Thalia said.

"Okay, the only thing appropriate about that song is the name."

"Well, Amazing Grace seems a little conceited, all things considered." They both laughed. "Seriously, I don't know. It's not the kind of thing I think about. What about you, Grover?"

"Finale B from-"

"That's so weird! We're singing that song for jazz choir for music festival. And Seasons of Love. You're getting a solo." Bianca said.

I could feel my palms start sweating at the thought of singing in front of a crowd, let alone singing by myself. "Really?"

"Yeah. You're the best tenor, so deal with it."

There was an awkward silence. "It's Thalia's turn to ask a question," Nico finally announced.

Thalia sighed and brushed her hair out of her face. "What's the stupidest thing you've ever done?"

That cranked up the awkwardness by about ten levels.

"I'm gonna go check the fuse box and see if I can get the power working." Bianca stood up.

"Yeah, I'll bring a flashlight." Nico grabbed one of the few that we'd found after lighting all the candles.

I didn't have a convenient excuse, so I was stuck there alone with the hormonal pregnant girl. I considered telling her that my sister had gotten pregnant in high school and gotten through it, but decided it wasn't a big consolation.

"You can stop giving me that sympathetic look," Thalia snapped.

"I don't know what else to do."

"You're in the closet. You know what it's like having to keep secrets."

"But…you know…your secret is gonna end up finding its way out into the open eventually."

She bit her lip. "I know."

I felt like I should do something other than just sit there awkwardly. "Umm, how about we make a deal?"

"What?"

"When people find out you're pregnant, I'll come out of the closet. No more secrets."

Okay, I had no idea why I'd just said that.

She smiled. It seemed out of place, kind of like when Bianca acted nice. "You're a really nice guy, Grover."

"Thanks."

A really nice guy who was good at lying to make people feel better. My parents were okay with having a daughter who got pregnant in high school, but they'd never live with a son who was gay.

Sometimes secrets were better left locked away.


	21. The Kind of Teacher Women Would Desire

Recap time! (:

There's a new substitute teacher. She's kind of creepy. She likes Percy. Oh boy.  
Thalia went to her first prenatal appointment. She told Luke she got an abortion. She really didn't. Uh oh.  
Chris told Clarisse that he doesn't date during basketball season, and now she really hates him. But Silena and Luke are together now. Oh, things have odd ways of working out.  
Percy got told he should watch out for an electrician turned mayor turned governor turned senator turned ambassador. Yeah, it's quite the resume. Intense.  
Annabeth has been her normal know-it-all self. She'll never make friends if she doesn't change her attitude.  
And Thalia and Bianca are now friends. Yeah, it's weird in a strangely perfect way.  
And that's what you've missed. ;) [And man, it feels like a lot!]

**Chapter Twenty-One  
****The Kind of Teacher Women Would Desire**

"Very developed ideas, Becky. Nice introduction, Grover. Travis...interesting topic." Mrs. M made her way around the room, slowly handing back the rough drafts of our papers and finding something nice to say about everyone.

"I'm Connor." The Stoll brother said, grabbing his paper from her. She didn't notice.

"Good word choice, Lea. Annabeth…pay attention to the notes I wrote on your paper. You have a long way to go." Annabeth's face turned bright red and it looked like she wanted to start screaming. Or throwing things. Or maybe just strangle Mrs. M.

That girl scared me.

"Very nice paper, Percy. Make sure to see the note I wrote on your references page."

My essay was about global warming. And even though my mom had practically written half of it for me, it wasn't a very nice paper. I could have plagiarized Green Eggs and Ham, turned it in, and gotten praised for being a genius. Mrs. M worshipped me.

She would ask me to stay after class to help her sort out papers.

When she passed by my desk, she would linger for a few seconds too long.

And even though she always wore those giant oversized sunglasses, I swore she was always looking at me.

So needless to say, I was kind of scared to look at what the heck she'd written on my paper.

The bad feeling I had about her increased when I saw the message written in bright red blocky handwriting.

_Percy, I think we need to talk one on one about things. Please see me today after school. –Mrs M._

On the last day before winter break? I wasn't staying a second longer than I had to. Especially with a creepy stalker of a teacher.

"Look over the corrections I've made on your papers. I want you to come back from your break with a second draft finished." Predictably, a few people groaned. "You can have the rest of the hour to start working."

She hadn't written any corrections on my paper. Any. I knew someone like Annabeth would find a million things wrong with it. It was creepy how much Mrs. M idolized me.

Like, really creepy.

I looked at her sitting at her desk out of the corner of my eye. She was focused right on me.

There was no way I was going to be anywhere near her room when the last bell rang.

* * *

The winter concert was the worst school event in existence. The only thing worse than Christmas music was Christmas music being butchered by pitchy junior high kids. I'd been going to these since middle school – I knew what to expect.

I should have known to knock on wood or something.

Mr. Sol promised me we could run through my solo a few times if I got there early, so I showed up half an hour before the other people were scheduled to arrive. Nico had decided he wanted to stay home, and our dad wasn't home…again. I wondered where he was, but then again, I really didn't want to know.

The music room was completely empty. "Mr. Sol? You there?"

This would have been a good time to turn around and wait in my car. I knew what had happened last time I'd shown up early. But, you know, stupid me. I went poking around before I decided to check his office.

He was sitting in there with his headphones turned up so loud I could hear them from ten feet away. Some dub step song was playing. Classy.

He didn't notice me so I got closer. His phone was vibrating on his desk. There was a new text message from Daphne…the bitch from the last time I'd caught him on his phone. He seemed pretty resolute on ignoring it, or maybe he just didn't hear it going off. When your music was that loud, you could easily ignore a nuclear war.

I tapped his shoulder.

"Jesus!" He whipped around, yanking out his headphones. I noticed his eyes were bloodshot.

"Should I be offended that you keep mistaking me for a middle-aged bearded man?" I retorted. "You said we could run through my solo, remember?"

"Bianca. Your solo's fine." His speech was obviously slurred. "They don't really care about how you sound. They care more about…" He stood up. I felt like he was just a few inches too close. "…the way you look. The way you act. They don't care about right notes if they can.." He brushed a piece of hair away from my face. "...feel the passion."

He kissed me. And I swear, the way I kind of leaned into him and went along with it for the first few seconds was just a stunned reaction. His lips were really soft, and he tasted minty…like mouthwash...like, when you washed out your mouth because you were trying to hide something.

I pushed him away. "Are you drunk?"

"No," he said defensively. I glared at him. "Okay, maybe a little," he conceded.

My drunken music instructor had just made out with me and all I could think about was whether or not he thought I was a good kisser. Something was wrong with me. "You've got a bunch of kids depending on you to direct them, and you're drunk."

"They'll be okay."

"You could get arrested."

"Not really. You're 18 and I'm 24." His confidence seemed a little shaky.

"The school board probably wouldn't really care."

"The guidance counselor comes to school drunk all the time." He was getting really defensive. I had him nervous.

Good. He deserved it.

"I don't think those girls who pretend to be suicidal during calculus tests are going to his office for a romantic rendezvous."

All of the sudden, he was kissing me again. Like, hands knotted in the hair and tongue down the throat kissing. And I liked it. Like, really liked it. "What are you doing?" I whispered when he pulled away for a second. Like, one of those little breathy sighs. I hated myself. I was so screwed.

"If the school board's gonna find out, I might as well get everything I can."

If that didn't make a girl want to swear off guys and become a nun, I don't know what would.

I pushed him away. "You're a pig."

"Wait, that came out wrong. I'm sorry. Bianca, will you just listen to me?" He grabbed my wrist as I tried to dramatically storm out of his office.

"Don't touch me," I hissed.

He finally got the picture and backed off. "I'm sorry."

"Yeah, so am I."

I sat on the choir risers for a few minutes, painfully aware of the fact that he was in his office not even twenty feet away. I pretended to play on my phone so he wouldn't get any ideas about coming out and talking to me.

Grover was the first person to arrive. "If you're here to get help with your oboe solo, don't even think about going in his office," I said loud enough that I was sure Mr. Sol could hear me.

Grover sat down next to me. "Giles gave me a ride. He works nights at his job. Trying to save money so he can go to college out of state when he graduates. My parents don't come to my concerts."

That made two of us.

A few people slowly arrived and grabbed their instruments. Things didn't get interesting until Silena walked in hand in hand with her brand new boyfriend.

"Thanks for the ride," she cooed, kissing him.

He seemed stiff around her, the opposite of how he'd been with Thalia. Not that I wanted those two back together. The guy was an asshole.

"Poor Thalia," Grover said to me. "I have to go get my oboe ready."

I must have been glaring at Silena, because she gave me the _jealous much?_ look and leaned into her boyfriend for round two. "I'll text you when I'm done," she said.

"Sure. See you then."

I tried to remind myself that he didn't know he had a pregnant ex-girlfriend who was going to a prenatal appointment tomorrow instead of enjoying her first day of winter break.

But it didn't work.

I really wanted to punch his face.

* * *

"Ten weeks. You're a fourth of the way done, Thalia." Doctor Zatari walked in to the room, smiling.

It didn't exactly make me jump for joy. I tried not to groan. "Yeah, but the worst is yet to come."

Doctor Zatari took a seat next to me and looked at my chart. I'd had a different nurse this time – thank God. "You've gained three pounds since we last saw you." She looked mildly concerned. "Let's see if we can't hear a heartbeat. Pull up your shirt please, dear."

I leaned back and did what she told me to. "But I thought you can't hear the heartbeat yet. I don't want to hear the heartbeat yet." On every pregnancy website, the expectant moms talked about how magical it was hearing their baby for the first time and how it made them really bond with their child. I did not want that. Not yet.

"Thalia, it's okay. I just want to make sure everything's okay with the baby." She was using her soothing voice. It wasn't helping much. "I know you're scared, but there's nothing to be worried about."

After she told me she needed to check that everything was okay. Yeah, reassuring. Even if I didn't want to love this baby, I didn't want anything bad to happen to it. Terrible mother in the making, I know.

The thing she was using looked just like the ultrasound thing, except it was connected to what looked like a giant Walkman instead of a computer screen. She nodded to herself as she moved the sensor around. It all sounded the same to me, but she seemed to notice something.

"Is that the heartbeat?" All I could hear was this whooshing sound. It didn't exactly connect with the image of a baby. Thank God.

"Yes."

A few minutes later, she set the machine down, looking less than satisfied. "We're going to do an ultrasound."

"I'm not going to look." According to the websites, the only thing more magical than the heartbeat was the actual image.

"That's fine."

She squirted goo on my stomach and grabbed a different machine. Okay, I hated myself for it, but I got curious and peeked. It was an old-fashioned ultrasound, not one of those creepy new 3D ones. All I saw a little blob of a head and a little blob of feet. Or at least I thought that was what it was. Again, no magic moment.

"Thalia, I have a surprise." Her tone was that same soothing one. At that moment, I hated it because I couldn't tell if good or bad news was coming.

"Okay."

"There's two."

"Surprises?"

"No. Babies."

I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach. "You've got to be fucking kidding me."

She pointed to a spot on the screen. "There's Twin A." She moved her hand a few inches over. "And there's Twin B."

"Are you sure it's not one that's just really-"

A nurse poked her head in the door. "I'm clocking out for the night." Her scrubs had little dancing babies on them. "Oh, twins. Aren't you the lucky girl?" she winked, looking at my ultrasound. "Enjoy your weekend, Narissara."

If Doctor Zatari were the type, I knew she'd have an _I told you so_ look on her face.

"Okay, Carol. See you Monday." Doctor Zatari had only been able to fit me at the very end of the day, the time when she would normally be checking out. I probably should have felt blessed or something.

She handed me a towel and set her equipment back in its place. I tried getting as much of the goo off as I could and forgot the images of the two little blobs.

"Tell me how you're feeling."

I glared at her. "How would you feel if you were 17, pregnant with twins, and the father was with someone else because he didn't know about any of it?"

She met my eyes. "I can't have children."

I'm a terrible person. My first instinct was to laugh. An OB/GYN who couldn't have kids? It was ironic in a way that inspired pity and humor at the same time.

"I'm sorry."

"You know the look people give you when they find out you're 17 and pregnant? You're giving me the exact same one right now, Thalia." She snapped on a pair of gloves. "I'm going to draw blood for a few tests." I guess that was her way of changing the subject.

"I don't like needles."

She smiled faintly as she stuck the needle in my arm. "You'll get over it by the time we're done. I assume you've narrowed down your options for this pregnancy, since you're here."

"I'm not getting an abortion if that's what you're asking." Was it still just an abortion if there were two babies? I tried not to shudder.

"But you're not sure what you're doing postpartum?"

"Nope." I was still trying not to think about it.

"Thalia, believe me when I tell you I'm not saying this just because you're a teenage mother, but there are lots of couples who would love to adopt twins." She pulled the needle out of my arm. "Couples who have been waiting for years."

"Like you and your husband?"

"No." Her tone was as close to icy as I imaged someone like her could get. "Have you considered how you want to deliver? Of course, that will probably all change now that you're expecting twins." There was the faintest trace, almost imperceptible, of envy in her voice.

"I thought you only had one option. A C-section."

"You can plan whatever you want as long as you stay flexible." I didn't say anything. Doctor Zatari sighed deeply. "I'm sorry, Thalia. It's been a long day."

"I know the feeling."

"Would you like to go out to dinner with me? I'm sorry Thalia, but I did a little digging in your medical history and saw that your mother passed away…and I know this is a difficult time for you. I want to make sure we make this pregnancy go as smoothly as possible."

Yeah, like that would ever happened.

I was trying not to let the twins thing sink in. Trying really, really hard. But reality was crushing in on me, and I had no idea what to do, and it was just really nice to know someone cared, or at least felt bad enough for you to pretend to.

"Sure. That would be great."


	22. Christmas Shopping

**Chapter Twenty-Two  
****Christmas Shopping, an Unexpectedly Dangerous Pastime**

"I went shopping on Black Friday with my mom once back in New York. These two old ladies got into a fistfight over 99 cent towels," I said, looking at how busy the mall was a few days before Christmas.

"I have 16 little kids I need to find stuff for. 16, Percy." Grover didn't seem to hear me. "And no matter what I get, someone ends up crying about how Harriet's Barbie is prettier, and Steven's truck has more wheels, and this is the exact same thing they got last year."

He made me happy to be an only child. I only had to get something for my mom, and she'd told me exactly what she wanted, right down to the shelf I could find it on in Victoria's Secret. I don't think she realized no guy would be caught dead in that store. Pregnancy was doing weird things to her mind.

"Get each of the girls the same Barbie and each of the boys the same truck." It seemed like the easiest solution.

"Taylor thinks she's too old for dolls. Tucker was born two weeks ago."

"Gift cards?"

"You're a genius."

Apparently Grover and his brother, Giles, liked to wait until the last minute to get their Christmas shopping done. He'd asked me if I wanted to come with, and I didn't need to be asked twice. My house was getting more and more suffocating.

Grover stopped at some toy store. "If I get each kid a $10 gift card, that's $160," he bleated morosely.

We wandered around the store for a few minutes. The shelves were looking pretty picked over. "So, what's your family story?" I finally asked.

"Do you want the long or the short version?" He picked up a cheap doll that had bright pink hair, then set it back down.

"Short, I guess."

"Greta's 30 and on her second marriage. She has six kids: Taylor, Todd, Tammi, Tiffany, Teagan, and Tucker. She's an accountant. Gram's two years younger. He's a dentist with four kids: Steven, Kat, Andrew, and Mary. He's kind of a jerk, and his wife is filing for divorce. Gabby has three kids. She had Angel three months after graduating high school, and Sarah and Jessie are identical. Gladys is a stay at home mom. She's got Harriet, Julie, and Wesley. And then there's Giles, who is a senior in high school and is probably going to marry his girlfriend as soon as they're done with college."

"That's the short version?"

"Yeah. And they all come to our house for every holiday. It's terrible. I'm getting each kid a $5 gift card. That's all I can afford."

I wondered what a Christmas with more than just your mom was like. Not that I was complaining – she'd always done the best she could with whatever money we had at the time.

Grover bought all 16 gift cards. "I spend $30 on Greta's family, and she's probably just going to get me an ugly sweater or something."

"That sucks. I have to go to Victoria's Secret."

"What? Why?" His eyes widened. Yeah, that was the normal guy reaction.

"My mom wants perfume for Christmas, and apparently Bath & Body isn't good enough."

"Okay, well you have fun in there. I'm gonna wait outside."

I gulped and headed into the ridiculously pink and girly store, trying to remember which perfume my mom had said she liked the best. They all smelled the same, anyway.

"Is there anything I can help you with?" a perky brunette asked me. The store was packed with girls desperately trying to find stuff, but of course the one guy got singled out as needing help.

"No, I'm okay."

I compared bottles of perfume for a few minutes, trying to figure out which one my mom would like best based on the name. Grumpy old women were pushing past me, grabbing what they wanted and quickly walking away. Grover probably thought I'd died in here or something.

You know that feeling you get when someone's right behind you? It was making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I hoped whoever it was would just go away.

It didn't happen. In fact, it got worse. Whoever it was pressed their sweaty hand over my mouth. "Hello, Percy," she hissed sweetly.

* * *

The Graces had decided not to get together for Christmas. Praise newborn baby Jesus.

However, Grandpa had decided to come to Michigan for a few weeks to visit with me and Nell. Well, he was more interested in visiting me, but Nell didn't know that.

"The food is really good, Nell," Grandpa lied, pushing his burnt chicken around on his plate. She'd tried. She'd failed. She was extremely emotionally unstable. Hence, we were trying to be nice about how terrible her cooking was.

"Yeah, really good." I shoved another bite in my mouth. Even if it normally would have made me gag, I was hungry. I was eating for three people.

Three people.

My mood immediately dropped about ten levels.

Nell had been really tired last night, so I'd picked up Grandpa at the airport by myself.

"I didn't get an abortion. I've seen the doctor twice. They're twins." I'd told him immediately once we were on the highway.

He'd just calmly fiddled with the radio station. "Does Nell know?"

"No."

And that was that. No questions about the future. Nothing. Absentee parenting at its finest.

Back to the present situation. Nell and Grandpa were talking about the couple horses we still kept out in the old stable. Ginger had cataracts in both eyes, and it was obvious that Torpedo was lonely. I'd only gone out to see them a few times since coming back home – I didn't like the horses, and they certainly seemed to hate me.

"If we got a few mares, we could start the business back up," Nell said. The business that closed even before my Grandpa was born.

"It's not that easy. Times have changed. None of the big businesses do it like that anymore," Grandpa argued. "All the big businesses use artificial insemination. And even if you could get something going, it's not profitable. Or necessary – we have plenty of money."

Delicate emotional state, I wanted to remind Grandpa. Wait, why was I defending Nell?

But to my surprise, Nell held her ground. "Thoroughbreds used for racing can't be conceived through artificial insemination."

"So you want to sell racehorses?"

"Why not? We used to be one of the best sellers in the country."

"50 years ago!" Grandpa scoffed.

I quit listening to their conversation, mostly because I knew nothing about breeding or racing horses. Yeah, call me an ungrateful rich girl. Nell, however, was more passionate than I'd ever seen her.

My phone started vibrating. Grover was calling me. Nell and Grandpa were still going at it, so they didn't notice when I walked out of the room to answer.

"Thalia, I need help," Grover said the second I picked up. Or that's what I think he said. He was talking way too fast.

"Okay, you need to slow down."

I heard him take a few shaky breaths. "Percy went in to Victoria's Secret an hour ago to get something for his mom, and he still hasn't come out yet. He's not answering his phone or anything and I don't know what to do and I went looking for him and couldn't find him and I need help and-"

"Where are you?" I interrupted.

"The mall in Degis."

"And Percy's missing?" I hardly knew who Percy was, but Grover seemed really scared. And he'd been really nice the one time I'd really talked to him.

"Yeah."

"Okay, I'm gonna drive over."

Nell and Grandpa were still going at it. I wondered how long it would be before the waterworks started on her part. "My friend has a friend who's missing so I'm driving over to Degis. I'll be back eventually," I shouted through the door. I don't think either of them heard me.

Half an hour later, I found Grover sitting at a bench at the mall. "My brother left already. I told him I was getting a ride home with you. I hope that's okay. And-" Again with the talking way too fast.

"Grover. That's okay. Now, what are we going to do?"

"Well…I haven't actually gone into the store yet."

I could have slapped him. "I just drove all the way over here, and you haven't even gone into the store yet to see if maybe he's just having a hard time deciding what he wants." He opened his mouth to defend himself. "Okay, whatever. I'm here now. I'll go look for him."

Victoria's Secret was an explosion of pink and strong perfume. My mom had loved the store; I hated it with a passion. There were a few flat-chested girls hopelessly looking at pushup bras, some grannies raping the clearance rack, and a few other people just browsing.

No Percy.

"Can I help you with something?" a brunette wearing ten pounds of makeup asked me.

"Yeah. I'm looking for someone. A guy." That should have been descriptive enough. People of the opposite sex avoided this store like the plague. "Dark hair, umm…"

"Was he shopping for perfume? Is he your brother?"

"Yeah." Why the hell not? Whatever got her talking.

"He left with your mom through the back door. She said he wasn't feeling well." This wasn't going well.

"Our mom's dead."

"Well, she was here. Big sunglasses. Her hair was wrapped up in this ugly scarf, no offense to her. She was darker…didn't exactly look a lot like him."

I pretty much ran out of the store and grabbed Grover. "Call Percy's mom. See if he's home."

He did what I asked while desperately trying to keep up with me. "Mrs. Jackson? Is Percy home? No, okay. Just wondering." He looked at me helplessly. "What's going on?"

"Well, it looks like we need to report a missing person."


	23. Ho, Ho, Ho

**Chapter Twenty-Three  
****Ho, Ho, Ho…**

"How do I look, Silena?" Mom asked, clipping a dangly snowflake earing in and smoothing a wrinkle in her way too tight striped dress.

_Like Santa's prostitute._ My mom had never been able to grasp that fine line between sexy and slutty. "Why don't you wear this?" I pulled a black dress out of her pile of discarded clothes. "It'll accent your complexion a lot better."

She shimmied out of the dress she'd been wearing before. I made a mental note to put it in our Goodwill box. She'd had it since she was my age. Some days she probably still thought she was my age. "Can you zip me up, hon?"

Like the dutiful daughter I was, I helped her while she sucked in her nonexistent stomach. "Liam's bringing his new girlfriend over. She's also a teacher. Dominik is still single – I'm starting to worry about him. And Violet…won't be coming this year."

Let me make this quick and painless.

Liam was born six months after my mom graduated high school. He's a tall sensitive ginger who enjoys teaching kindergartners their ABC's. I honestly thought he was gay until he was 18 and brought his first girlfriend home.

Dominik is in the middle of culinary school. When we were younger, people always asked us if he was adopted, because…well, apparently his dad was half Asian and half African. Honestly, I thought the mix made him drop-dead gorgeous. If he wasn't my brother, I'd go for him.

Violet? Well, let's not ruin today by going there.

"And how could I forget? We get to meet your new boyfriend?" Mom giggled, applying her mascara while looking at me. Yeah, that's right. She did this so much she didn't even need the aid of a mirror. "How long has it been now? Two weeks? Oh, that's exciting."

"I'd be more excited if Chad wasn't coming."

"Oh, don't pout. You'll give yourself premature worry lines," Mom said, doing as close as she ever did to scolding me. Chad was her latest boyfriend – only the thousandth guy she'd deemed the one. They'd been dating for two months. In the world of Misty Beauregard, that was forever. "Come on, hon. I'll do your hair."

Christmas had always been a holiday that my family skipped. I think it's because when we were little, Mom never had much money for gifts. So to compensate, she always tried to make New Year's Eve more special.

And now that we were older, the tradition had kind of stuck. And with a mom who now spoiled you all year round, you didn't mind missing one holiday.

So I was probably making my mom sound like a completely terrible person. Trust me, she had her moments, but she was far from terrible. I was just nervous about Luke meeting her.

Previous boyfriends had had reactions ranging from intimidation to being totally turned on. It made me want to shout out that she'd had a boob job and had celebrated her 40th birthday by getting a shot of Botox right between the eyes.

So what if I was an attention whore? She was the one who'd passed the trait on to me.

"There you go, babe. You look amazing." I'd always wondered why my mom hadn't just become a beautician, and instead struggled to work her way to the top in the news casting business. But now she was the best anchor for the county's most popular station. I think the implants helped.

Mom raked her fingers through the soft curls she'd added to my hair and sighed. "Oh, to be young and in love again," she sighed.

"I'm not in love," I snapped at her.

She raised an eyebrow and reached for a can of hairspray. "You haven't been able to stop talking about him since you started dating. Have I given you the talk lately?"

"Don't have sex. If you do, condoms are in top drawer of the dresser," I recited.

"You know, I think the problem with parents nowadays is they try to tell their kids that sex is some terrible forbidden thing." She let loose half the can of hairspray. "And then it just makes them want to try it more. If everyone was as open as I was with you and your brothers, things would probably be a lot better." I noticed she intentionally left out Violet.

Thank God I had two older brothers to actually explain things to me.

"When I was your age, I remember-"

Thank God the doorbell rang right at that moment. "I'll get it." I hopped out of the bathroom, straightening my new sweater dress as I ran to the door.

"Hey, little sis. What's up?" Dominik stepped in, shrugging off his coat. I'd forgotten that he was coming earlier to make our New Year's meal.

"You saved me from having to listen to one of Mom's sexploits. Did you know Violet's not coming?"

He shrugged uncomfortably. "Yeah, I guess so."

The awkward silence that always came whenever someone mentioned our sister was right on cue. Finally, he said, "I went to see her on Christmas."

"How was she?"

"I don't know. Normal?"

It was time for a subject change. "Mom's concerned that you're still single."

"Oh, just wait till she meets Kassidy. She's like, identical to Mom." Dominik rolled his eyes. Liam was the definition of a mama's boy. "Only, you have to imagine mom as a 4th grade teacher. Come on, I gotta start cooking. You can help."

I couldn't crack an egg without screwing up, and Dominik knew that. So while he went to town taking over our kitchen, I took a seat on the countertop and crossed my legs daintily.

"So tell me about the new boyfriend." He cut a tray of vegetables with superhuman speed and threw them in a frying pan.

"His name is Luke. He's a junior." Dominik nodded, placing pieces of chicken in with the veggies. "Dom, you can keep a secret right?"

"I still haven't told Mom about the time you changed the F to an A on your 2nd grade spelling test," he said.

I bit my lip. "Luke broke up with his last girlfriend because she got pregnant…with his baby," I added before he could ask for clarification. "And she got an abortion. They broke up…and we started dating a few days later."

Dominik turned the heat to low and sighed. He walked across the kitchen so we were eye to eye. "Sil, remember the three rules of dating that me and Liam taught you?"

"Yeah."

"What are they?"

"No sex on the first date. No one old enough to be your parent. And never be the rebound," I recited dutifully, before leaping to defend myself. "But, it's different. This is probably the only chance I'm ever going to get, and-"

"Rebounds never work."

"Brad and Angelina?"

"A rare exception to never. You know we tell this stuff because we don't want you to get hurt. Right, Silena? And a guy who got a girl pregnant-"

"Don't tell Mom," I interrupted.

"I won't. But it doesn't earn him brownie points."

Dominik spent the rest of the time telling me about how he was almost done with school, and how he planned on living a few hours away so I could come see him when Mom got to be too much to handle. "There's this really fancy restaurant…Prancie's, or something….and they've basically all but said they'll hire me as soon as I'm done with my classes."

"That's cool." I checked my hair for split ends. Mom had put in way too much spray, and it felt too stiff.

"You're distracted. What's wrong?"

"I'm nervous."

Dominik let out a deep sigh I had a feeling he'd been holding. "Keep it PG-13 around Mom. Tell him you have your period if he starts getting too pushy. And if-"

The doorbell rang at the most convenient time. "I'll get it."

My gorgeous boyfriend was at the door, looking stunning in the button-down I'd stolen from Liam's closet. It wasn't like he even remembered the boxes of stuff he'd left here when he moved out. "You clean up nice," I told him.

"And you look amazing." He put his hands on the small of my back and pulled me in for a kiss.

Things were going great, until Luke got his first glimpse of my mom. He had the typical _I'm trying to pretend I'm not staring, but oh my God your mom is hot_ reaction. She'd changed out of the black dress into some red monstrosity that showed off way more cleavage than necessary.

"Mom, Dominik – this is Luke."

"Call me Misty," Mom gushed. I could tell she approved by the way her eyes lit up when she saw us. "Mrs. Beauregard makes me feel old. And, well, I'm not even married." She giggled. I could tell Luke was trying really hard to keep his gaze above her chest. I had to remember to tell him they weren't real later.

The doorbell rang, and Mom and Dominik left to get it. Luke slid his hand out of mine and reached into his pocket for his phone.

"Put that away," I said immediately. I wanted his focus on me.

"My brother is proposing to his girlfriend tonight. He needs moral support," he told me while typing.

"Really? That's romantic. I didn't you had a brother."

He knew that was his cue to fill me in. The boy was a fast learner. "I have three. Blake's girlfriend is pregnant…..six months, I think. And he feels like he has to do it."

"Would you feel like you had to marry a girl you got pregnant?" Dominik reentered the room. Ouch. I guess I shouldn't have said anything to him.

Luke looked him right in the eye. "I'm never going to be in that situation." _Again_. Mentally, he was definitely adding that part, I told myself.

Dom held his hands up in surrender. "Okay, just thought I would ask."

"He hates me," Luke whispered.

"He's protective," I assured him, pleased that he was worried what my brother thought of him.

"Time to eat, lovebirds," Dominik called over his shoulder, heading for the dining room.

Dom had been right. Kassidy was mom's twin. She was thin, blonde, and kind of an airhead. I wonder what her 4th grade students thought of her. You could tell the way Liam really liked her from the way he hung on every word she said, and the way he would occasionally touch her wrist lightly and give her _the look_.

I was probably going to have a sister-in-law before Easter.

When we bowed our heads to say grace (something we wouldn't have done if it wasn't for Chad), I saw Luke pull out his phone and check the latest update from his brother.

"Is he really that stressed about it?" I whispered

Luke pulled up his brother's last message and handed me the phone. _I don't think I can do this….you're only 16….you don't understand what it's like to be stuck with someone….._

_She's pregnant. She needs you. Just do it and you'll feel better._ I typed the message out for him, then handed the phone back. He nodded slightly and hit send.

"So Silena says you're a junior," Dominik said. I hoped he wouldn't bring up what else I'd said.

"Yeah."

"Play any sports?" Liam asked.

"Track until I hurt my ankle," he lied. Both of my brothers had been gone long enough that they'd missed the smoking and drinking scandal that had gotten him kicked off the team last year. And Mom was too busy finding or keeping whatever guy she liked at the moment to pay attention to school news besides what I told her.

"Do you have any siblings?" Mom asked. Poor Luke probably felt like he was being interrogated.

"Three brothers. I'm the youngest."

"Oh, that's so cute!" Kassidy giggled. "Silena's the youngest in her family too." I waited for Liam to correct her. He didn't.

Luke's hand was in my lap. He dropped his phone for me, then proceeded to eat whatever concoction Dom had made. I didn't know what it was, but it sure tasted good.

_SHE SAID YES!_ Attached with the text was a picture that had obviously been taken by one of them, since the camera was only a few feet away. The girl had pretty dark hair and was holding up her hand so the ring was clearly visible. And the guy looked enough like Luke that you could tell they were siblings – they had the same hair and eyes, but Luke's features were a lot more refined.

"Congrats," I whispered, squeezing his knee. He wrapped his fingers around mine and gave me his version of _the look_. It made my heartbeat soar. I knew Dom was giving me the death stare without even looking.

Luke was on his phone on and off for the rest of the dinner. I decided to let him get away with it – he was doing really well with keeping his eyes off my mom, who was flirting shamelessly with Chad.

Chad was at least ten years younger than Mom. He had just divorced his third wife. Maybe someone should have told Mom about the rebound rule.

Watching the ball drop was a tradition – no matter how boring it was. What made it more interesting was knowing that my first kiss of the year was going to come from my amazing boyfriend, and afterwards we could head up to my bedroom for privacy.

"Happy New Year," I whispered playfully before kissing him. "Come on, my room now."

"Be good," Mom said, somewhat distracted by Chad, who was nibbling on her ear. Gross.

Out of all the guys I'd dated, Luke was one of the few who actually got to see my room. I was worried about what he'd think of the pale pink walls and Marilyn Monroe posters I'd had since I was in middle school, but he seemed more concerned with…other things.

I shut the door and locked it. Luke gave me a cocky half grin from where he was sitting on the bed, like he could think of an amazing way to ring in the New Year. I'll give you three guesses.

He probably didn't even realize I was a virgin.

I sat on his lap and wrapped my legs around him. Wearing a dress made the whole thing seem much more…sordid. I loved it. Or maybe the one glass of champagne Mom had let me have was getting to me.

Luke knotted his hands in my hair and pressed his mouth against mine hungrily. "God, you're amazing," he moaned. Inside, I was beaming.

It wasn't long before his hands started wandering. Okay, Silena. This is okay. I was starting to worry about telling him no when he pushed further. But, the sensible part of my brain was starting to turn off. Everything just felt so…right.

Of course, the moment had to be ruined. His phone vibrated against my leg. "Ignore it," he whispered, tugging on my lip. "It's just my brother."

I probably would have been able to let it go, until he added the last part. It sounded…guilty. I reached into his pocket and looked at the screen.

Thalia.

I narrowed my eyes and stood up. My dress had hiked itself above my waist. Thank God I'd decided to wear leggings. "What. The. Hell?" My voice quickly rose to a shriek. "Have you been talking to your brother this whole time, or her?"

"Both…but, Silena, I swear it's nothing. She just accidentally sent me a text about that new kid who's missing…and we kind of started talking…and I'm sorry. I won't talk to her anymore," he stammered.

"Yeah, you won't." I handed him his phone back. I was trying to blink back tears. Okay, maybe I was overreacting. But I'd been nearly ready to have sex with him.

He tugged on my hand, an apologetic look on his face. "Silena, you know I'm sorry."

"Yeah. Whatever. You can go home now."

He sighed and stood up. Right before he walked out the door, he pressed something into my hand. I guess I was too emotionally drained to look, or throw it back, or anything but stand there.

Once I heard the door click downstairs, I looked at the small little object in my hand.

It was his class ring, gold with a citrine stone – probably his birthstone.

My phone vibrated on my dresser.

_I'm sorry. Love you._

Oh, he was definitely forgiven. But he didn't need to know that…yet.


	24. Love Never Hurts

**Chapter Twenty-Four  
****Love Never Hurts**

"Thanks for the ride," Silena said perkily, throwing her backpack and purse in the backseat before taking the seat next to me. I had to drive to the other side of town, but it wasn't like it was a huge venture. The part I minded was her making me come to school 45 minutes earlier so she could go to jazz choir.

"You tell me that every morning."

"Well, I appreciate it every morning." She leaned over and kissed me, letting her hand rest just a little higher than my knee. "My mom's happy she doesn't have to worry about me anymore."

Most moms would start to worry once their daughter started dating an older guy. Her mom seemed to love it.

Silena kept her hand on my leg as I pulled out of her driveway. It was the third day back from school break, and she'd long since forgiven me. And she hadn't stopped wearing the ring I'd given her. Things couldn't get any better.

And I was about to risk ruining it all.

"And speaking of my mom, I want to meet your family." Her hand was inching up my leg slowly. Before I could protest, she added, "You met my mom and got to gawk at her fake boobs. It's only fair."

"You don't want to meet my mom." I hoped she would drop it.

But Silena never dropped anything. She started massaging very…sensitive areas. I gritted my teeth. "Silena. Not while I'm driving."

"Please, Luke?" she cooed. "It won't be that bad."

It was getting really hard to focus on the road. I finally broke down. "I'll talk to her, okay? Now stop."

"Okay. We're here anyway," she chirped perkily as I pulled into the school parking lot. "How about Friday? Mom has a date with Chad anyway, so I've got nothing to do."

I knew she wasn't going to let it go. "I'll talk to Mom tonight. But she works a lot. She's probably too busy." And I hadn't told her about the whole Thalia thing yet, but I was pretty sure she knew we weren't together anymore.

"Well, it doesn't have to be Friday." She leaned over and kissed me. "We'll talk more later. Thanks for the ride." She grabbed her stuff and headed out. I wondered what she thought I was going to do for the next hour and knew it was far from what was actually going to happen.

My phone vibrated. _You sure you want to do this?_

_Just meet me in my car._

Thalia had accidentally texted me once over Christmas break, and things had taken off from there. It was weird – we'd never even talked that much when we were together. And it was easy to forget everything I hated her for when she was only a name on a screen.

Last night in the middle of some random conversation, she told me she needed to talk to me tomorrow. I told her I drove Silena into jazz choir, and she could meet before school. She claimed it was important. I didn't know whether or not to believe her, but I wanted to know what she had to say.

Curiosity killed the cat.

A few minutes later there was a tap on the window. This was a bad, bad idea. Silena would kill me if she ever found out. I was starting to regret this.

But I unlocked the door.

"Your girlfriend's okay with this?"

"She doesn't need to know everything I do."

"You gave her your class ring. Face it – you're whipped."

We glared at each other. So much for being civil.

I tried to remember everything Kevin had told me about him and his girlfriend…fiancé. Who cared if it went against the advice of some random mailman? I doubted he'd be offended. "I would have married you if you'd told me."

"And then what were you planning on? Us playing house until the baby got here and you realized this wasn't what you wanted for the rest of your life?" She laughed haughtily. "And what makes you think I would want to marry you?"

"Maybe because every time I've seen you in the last year, you've wanted to have sex."

"That doesn't mean anything."

Cue another intense stare-down. This time, she looked away first. I guess that worried me. She was the type to stand up for herself, to never back down.

"Is everything okay?"

"Yeah. Why wouldn't it be?" she snapped. Her tone basically said the exact opposite.

"I don't know. It's not like you'd tell me if something was wrong, anyway." I wished I could shove the words back into my mouth.

"I didn't tell you because you're incapable of making any decision that requires some kind of long-term commitment. And you know what? This was stupid. I'm just going to leave now so you don't have to worry about your little slut of a girlfriend finding out anything." She stormed out of the car and slammed the door behind her.

I really should have let her go. I knew it.

But stupid me got out of the car and chased after her. "Thalia, stop. Dammit, can you not run away from everything for once?" I grabbed her wrist and jerked her back just a bit more forcefully than necessary. She stumbled right into my chest, then quickly righted herself.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You run off to California without saying goodbye. You come back, sleep with me, and leave again. Next you get pregnant and hide it from me. And now here you are again, backing out right away when things get difficult."

"You have no idea what you're saying."

"Well then quit being a bitch and tell me!"

She slapped me. And I swear, if I could take back what I did next, I would.

My fingers curled into a fist, and I punched her so hard she fell to the pavement. She stared up at me, completely dazed and confused. Somehow it made me feel worse than if she'd been angry.

_Thalia, I'm so sorry. I don't know why I did that. I'm so sorry._ I was thinking the words, but they were caught in my throat. I didn't even give her a hand up – I couldn't move. What had I just done?

She slowly got to her feet. Faint bruises were already starting to form around her right eye. "Never do that again, Luke." Her voice had this scary forcefulness to it. "Not to me. Not to Silena. Not to anyone. Understand?"

"I'm sorry." My voice wasn't much more than a whisper.

"I really don't give a damn. Just leave me the fuck alone."

* * *

It had been one of those days. Enough said.

_I got your homework for u. Can I come over?_ I texted Thalia, who hadn't been at school today, as soon as the final bell rang. I need to talk to u.

Her response came shortly before I got to my car. _Thanks. Sure_. So, call me crazy for reading deeply into a two word text, but it seemed like something was wrong. Another text came a few seconds later. _I'm in the living room. Just let yourself in._

Yeah, something was wrong.

Thalia was sitting on the couch pouring over some book, discarded bags of junk food thrown around her. A tub of ice cream was melting on the coffee table. She looked up at me when I walked in, showing off an ugly black eye.

"I got kicked by a horse and decided it was better to stay home," she said flatly, shoving a handful of chips into her mouth.

There was no way I was buying that story. I dumped her books on the floor and took a seat next to her. "What are you looking at?"

"This book my doctor gave me. It's got all these couples who want to adopt," she mumbled, handing it to me. It was open to a page with a picture of a young couple posing outside of a big house. There was all this information on the next page about their jobs, interests, and all this other stuff that just made them sound really fake.

"So you're thinking adoption now?" I peeked at her through the corner of my eye. Either she'd consumed way too many calories in the past eight hours, or she was starting to get the beginnings of a baby bump.

She caught me staring and glared. "Bianca, there are two of them. Two. I didn't even think I could handle one…and there's no way I want them growing up with Luke as a dad. Adoption is the only option."

Thalia had called me the day after her appointment and told me about having twins, but when I'd asked her what she was going to do, she'd yelled at me to get off her case and give her time to figure it out. The next time we'd talked had been about Percy Jackson being missing, and you just didn't jump from abducted kid to pregnancy plans. I figured when she wanted to talk about it, she would.

"And Luke still doesn't know?"

She flinched. "I was going to tell him this morning, but we started talking, and…" It really wasn't that hard to put two and two together.

I raised an eyebrow. "You said you got kicked in the face by a horse this morning."

"Check out the couple on page seven." She pretended not to hear me. "They seem kind of nice. At least they're not all fake like the other ones, and-"

"Did he hit you?"

"-they're willing to do an open adoption, but that's just weird, you know?" She continued to babble on and on. "Like, 'Hey, look at how great we're doing at raising the kids you gave up.'"

"Thalia. I swear I won't judge you or do anything. Just tell me."

Her lower lip quivered. "We were fighting; I knew I was making him mad, but…God, I'm so pathetic, Bianca. My mom had a boyfriend who hit her once. She moved us out right away and made me promise never to end up with someone like that. Then next week he sent her flowers or some shit and she was right back in bed with him."

I didn't know what else to do other than flip to page seven and look at the couple that she liked. The girl had short dark hair and a big smile. Her husband had his arms wrapped around her and was looking down at her adoringly. "John and Melissa," I read.

Thalia pointed to their biography. "She's working on becoming a lawyer, and he's a plastic surgeon. They're really young compared to everybody else, but they seem cool. But there's also Stacy and Noah…." She flipped to another page. "They own a restaurant and have already adopted kids from Cambodia."

"What if they don't stop with your kids and keep adopting till they're like…TV show worthy?"

"Yeah. Good point. Then there's-"

"Have you been looking at this all day?"

"Maybe." I gave her a look. "Yes. Okay, I need a break. You said you needed to talk about something."

Now wasn't the right time. The mood wasn't right, or maybe I was just too scared to tell someone. What if she thought I was crazy? What if she thought it was a horrible, disgusting thing?

"No, that's okay. It can wait. Let's look at couples."

I could tell her about the very illicit relationship that was developing between me and my music teacher later.

Very, very illicit.

* * *

My head felt like it had been slammed against a wall…multiple times. I wondered what the heck had happened last night to make me feel so crappy, but my mind was completely blank. And thinking made my splitting headache even worse, so I gave up on remembering.

Before opening my eyes, I tried to move my hands to rub away that weird gunk that always formed in the corners.

Okay, this sounds incredibly stupid, but I couldn't. Like, my hands were tied together. And I tried opening my eyes, but I couldn't. Blindfolded? This was so weird.

Panic was starting to creep in. "Hello?" My voice was hoarse. "Is anyone there?"

"Oh, Percy. So glad to see you're awake." I heard a familiar voice and felt slimy hands on my face. "Sorry about tying you to the chair, but last time I gave you a little bit of freedom, you tried to run away," she said sweetly, patronizingly.

I could feel her hot breath on my neck. "Who are you? Where am I?"

"Oh, Percy. I didn't hit you that hard, did I?" I felt her sit on my lap and run her fingers through my hair. "You poor thing." Her fingers lightly brushed a bump on the back of my head.

"Ow! Get off me!" I screamed.

She pressed a hand over my mouth. I felt like I could puke. "Not so loud!" she scolded. "Someone might hear you. Do you really want me to have to gag you again?"

"You're crazy! Someone help me! I've been abducted!" I shouted again as soon as she lifted her hand.

"Damn kid," she hissed, ripping the blindfold off my face and shoving it in my mouth. My screams were muffled as she tied it firmly. "Why are you being so difficult? All you need to do is get your dad to come save you."

She stood up and started pacing. Slowly, I opened my eyes. The room was dark, lacking windows and lit only by a small lamp in the corner. It had a bed, dresser, and nothing else. I'd never seen it before in my life.

And she…was my substitute English teacher? Her dreadlocks were pulled into a messy bun, and she was still wearing sunglasses. I blinked a few times, but the hideous image didn't change. Mrs. M?

"Really, Percy. I don't want to hurt you. But your father hurt me, yes he did. And he needs to come back and face what he did." She was talking to herself. "All you need to do is call him, get him to come here, and then you can go right back to your mom and your silly life."

I would have given her the car crash story, but the gag didn't exactly expedite conversation.

"And don't give me the silly story about a car crash." Well, so much for that idea. "Honestly, that's all you've been saying, little brat. But you and I both know that's not true. He's alive. And he's hiding, but you have to know where."

Things had gone from kind of scary to downright terrifying. I had no idea where I was or how I got here. And Mrs. M had definitely lost it.

She turned back to me. "You've been here for over a week, Percy. No one's going to find you. The only way out is to get him to come save you. I have a phone right here." She held out one of those crappy pay as you go phones. Like, the ones you could pay for with cash so they couldn't be tracked to you. "Just promise me you'll call him. And don't get any big ideas about calling the police. Remember last time? Was being shoved in the closet for three hours fun?"

So I'd spent a whole week with her that I didn't remember. The thought gave me goose bumps.

I shook my head and tried to convey the fact that I would love to call my dad if it got me out of here, but I had no idea who he was or how to find him.

She reached into the dresser and pulled out a crappy old yearbook. "Let's refresh your memory, shall we?" She flipped open the book to a page that was bent and shoved it in my lap. "There's me, back when I was beautiful."

Gorgonna Medusen. It was a senior picture of a girl with shiny dark hair and blue eyes, smiling even though she had this giant snake wrapped around her neck. Even so, she was kind of a far cry from the pyscho that was standing in front of me.

"And there he is." She pointed to another picture. This one was of a guy who'd opted for the simple portrait. His dark hair brushed his sea green eyes, and he had this smirk that I knew made teachers label him as the kid to watch out for. I guess…he looked like me. A lot.

Dean King.

I shook my head. "Insolent little brat!" She slapped me, knocking the chair down. Good news: I did not sustain another head injury. Bad news: it was only because my arm took the worst of the fall. And let me tell you, there's nothing funny about hitting your funny bone.

The gag muffled my scream, and tears pooled in my eyes. It hurt. Like, this is probably broken hurt. And I don't suppose Mrs. M/Gorgonna Medusen wanted to make a trip to the ER.

She grabbed a handful of hair and yanked me back up. "I've got to go back to that stupid little school like nothing's wrong." She turned her back to me and looked for something in the dresser. I could smell something that reminded me a lot of rubbing alcohol.

"It's noble how you want to protect your dad," she continued. "But he obviously doesn't care about you. And I'm afraid if you don't cooperate soon, we're going to have to try…other things."

She was holding a wet cloth in her hand, which she immediately pressed against my face. No warning or anything. I tried not to breathe, but eventually my survival instinct won and I took giant breaths of whatever toxic fumes were coming off that thing.

And then everything went black.


	25. Twists of Fayte

**Chapter Twenty-Five  
****Twists of Fayte**

"So you're going to meet his parents? You two have only been dating for a month – things must be getting serious." Mom combed her hands through my hair. The implied question was obvious. _You two haven't had sex yet, right?_

I folded my arms across my chest. I'd changed clothes six times, finally deciding on a pale pink sweater and an old pair of jeans. Mom had insisted on straightening my hair, but I drew the line at her doing my makeup. Her idea of casual was more than enough for a beauty pageant.

"Relax, Mom. Things aren't that serious." _Yet_, I added silently to myself. "And Luke's going to be here soon."

"Are you nervous? I remember Dominik's girlfriends would always be so shy and timid." Mom clucked her tongue. But really, she wasn't the greatest at the whole thing. One time, she'd asked a girl if she'd been the one who gave Dom the giant hickey on his neck. I swear her blush didn't go away the entire night.

"No, I'm not," I lied. I hadn't let Luke forget that I wanted to meet his mom, and he'd fought me the whole time. Completely unexpected, one day he'd picked me up before school and told me he talked to his mom. He said she'd said yes, but I wasn't supposed to expect anything special.

Before Mom could ask another question, I heard a car pull into our driveway. "Well, he's here. Gotta go." I ducked out of her grip and headed for the door.

"Be back by 11," she called after me. Like she'd care if I wasn't.

Luke seemed distracted when I got in the car. "You look nice," he said, pulling out of the driveway. "I told you not to dress up."

I tried not to roll my eyes. "I didn't."

The drive to town shouldn't have been too long, but we were stuck right behind an Amish buggy going up a giant hill. He didn't seem to be in the mood for talking, so I sat there and twirled his ring around my finger.

"Mom couldn't stand Thalia," Luke finally said. "She's actually…really excited to meet you."

I tried to hide my giant smile. I'd met the parents of a few boyfriends, and they were always way more welcoming when they'd hated their son's last girlfriend. "What about your dad? Is he…?" I left the question open.

"Some ass who ruined my mom's life and then abandoned us?" I was starting to figure out that he was really wound up about something. Come to think of it, he'd been off for the last few days. "I've never met him, and I don't want to."

I wanted to ask him about his three other brothers, but now was obviously not the time. "I've never met my dad either," I volunteered. He wasn't anything more than an abstract figure that sent giant child support checks every month.

He didn't answer. Instead, he accelerated and passed the buggy like a bat out of hell. And for the rest of the car ride, there was nothing but painfully awkward silence.

Shallow Lake wasn't a huge town, but there was a fine line between the people who had money and the people who didn't. Let's just say the Castellans obviously fell into the latter category. Their house was small and in bad need of a new paint job.

Luke parked on the side of the street and sighed. "Just don't say I didn't tell you so when this goes terrible."

"It's not going to be that bad," I protested, hopping out of the car and running to catch up with him without tripping over all the slushy snow.

He grabbed my hand, but I had the feeling it was more of a habit than a genuine gesture of affection. A girl could tell these things. It was going to be a long night.

"Mom, we're here!" Luke shouted as soon as we walked through the door.

I heard pots and pans clanging, then a woman stepped out into the hallway. She was short, 20 pounds overweight, and her blonde hair had obvious gray roots. She had a tight smile plastered on her face. I imagined her as being pretty…20 years ago. His mom was, well, old. "You don't need to yell, Luke."

I put a fake smile on my face and squeezed Luke's hand. "I'm Silena Beauregard."

"Are you related to the reporter on TV? I swear you look just like her."

So he and his mom were obviously not very close. "I'm her daughter," I said sweetly, digging my nails into Luke's hand. He was going to get chewed out later.

His mom smoothed some of the wrinkles in her shirt. "Well, I have a few things to finish up, and then we can eat." She turned on her heels and headed back into the kitchen.

"Told you this was a bad idea," he said.

"Well, maybe if you'd pull your head out of your ass, things would go a little bit better," I hissed, folding my arms across my chest. I gave him a glare that would make most people beg for forgiveness – something I'd learned from my mom.

"Whatever. You wanted to do this."

He led me to their dining room. The chairs were mismatched and the table had phone books shoved under one leg that was shorter than the others. I tried not to judge, really I did, but it was hard not to.

"Kind of different from your house, huh?" he asked, reading my mind. But the weird thing was, he didn't seem embarrassed or anything. "Mom's a nurse, and she works a lot just to get us by."

I didn't exactly know how to respond to that, so I didn't. It was obvious they weren't getting huge child support checks.

A few seconds later, the doorbell rang. "Expecting someone?" I raised an eyebrow as Luke bolted out of the room to get it. He didn't answer me.

I heard Luke's voice and another guy's, though I didn't know who it was. He sounded older. "Mom, the UPS guy needs help delivering something. I'll be back later." I heard the door slam, and then nothing.

Well, this was unexpected. I slumped into one of the chairs and shook my head.

His mom entered a few seconds later. "I'm sorry," she said quietly as she took the seat across from me.

"Something's been wrong with him the last few days."

She exhaled loudly. "Something's been wrong with him since the day he was born."

This family was just bursting at the seams with love.

Another one of those damn awkward silences started, and frankly, I was kind of sick of it, so I blurted out the first thing that came to my mind. "I think it has something to do with Thalia."

Her eyes lit up, like Mom's did when she was on the phone with a friend and they were sharing secrets about whatever people over 40 talked about. "Everything's always got something to with that damn girl."

I took that as a sign that she knew everything. "I can't believe that she thought she could get an abortion and then keep living her life without ever telling him she got pregnant."

Luke's mom's face turned red. "She what?" Her voice quickly rose to a shriek.

So maybe I should have known that Luke probably hadn't told her. But hey, he hadn't told me not to tell her. And he'd basically dumped me here. "Yeah. Back in early December. She was pregnant, and she took care of it without telling him. He found out and dumped her right then and there," I gushed.

She took a few deep breaths and shook her head. She stood up and started pacing. "That bitch…he's so stupid thinking…but he never thinks…no, he's just like…" She was like a volcano right before it exploded, spewing out little bursts of lava.

Time to play the sympathetic friend – except, I'd never had to do it for a situation like…this. Oh well. If I wanted her to like me, the best thing to do was to calm her down about Luke and keep her going about Thalia.

I stood up and put a hand on her shoulder. "You sound like you need to talk."

She sat back down, and I took the seat next to her. I wondered how she'd feel telling a 15-year-old her life story, but it was obvious she didn't have many people to talk to. "Luke was the kind of kid who if you told him not to stick a fork in the light socket, he would just to see what would happen. I swear, we'd been to the ER at least 50 times before he turned six. And then he met…that damn girl, and she just encouraged it."

Everyone remembered those two in grade school – they'd been inseparable. The betting pool had already started about when they would first get together. It was weird, since at that age, most boys and girls avoided each other at all costs.

"Then she and her mom just packed up and left – no explanation, no nothing. And Luke would never admit it, but it crushed him. His first semester of high school, his highest grade was a C…minus. He started drinking and smoking, thinking I wouldn't notice, but hello? I'm a nurse. Every time something started going right, he found some way to ruin it. And then that bitch just walks right back into his life, and he's willing to forget everything and go back to her."

I took a deep breath. "You know, she really hurt him. I think it would help him a lot if…you know, acted supportive." Now I guess it was time for a confession of my own. "He's still talking to her – at least, he was a few weeks ago. And I can tell he still thinks about her…a lot. If she got down on her knees and begged for forgiveness, I bet he'd take her back."

"Oh, I think his dad is definitely trying to push him away from that. Of course, it would probably be more effective if he would actually own up to the fact that he's his father instead of-"

"Luke told me on the way here he doesn't know his dad," I interrupted.

"He thinks he doesn't." The tone of her voice told me she wasn't saying anything more about that issue. "Silena, you seem like a nice girl. So please, don't waste your time with my son."

* * *

I'd gotten a B on my English paper. Yes, a B. My dad had read that paper and told me it was flawless. Well, after the time I'd made him read it and pick it apart so I could rewrite it and make it better.

I swear, Mrs. M had it out for me.

So while everyone else was running to lunch, I headed up to the English room to ask how she justified giving me such a terrible grade. Except, I got there and she was nowhere to be seen. Her door was wide open and the lights were on, but it was safe to say the room was completely empty.

I wandered in, thinking that she might come back in a few minutes. A few minutes came and went, and I thought maybe she had some notes on her desk, so I guess I started…snooping. And though I didn't find any notes, I found a Shallow Lake yearbook from the 80s. It had obviously been a graduate's, because the first few pages were filled with notes and signatures.

What I was doing was probably wrong, but I shoved the yearbook into my binder and darted out of the room. Hey, she had given me the worst grade of my life. Maybe the yearbook would have some great insight into her terrible personality.

Or maybe I was just a nosy brainiac who didn't respect other people's privacy.

I waited until my study hall to look at it. I even checked the master schedule to make sure Mrs. M had a class 6th hour, just in case she got any ideas about sleuthing around to see who had taken it. Which was admittedly kind of paranoid, because I didn't even know if she'd realized it was missing yet.

Since Shallow Lake High had owned its own printing press since as long as anyone could remember for a reason no one could figure out, our yearbooks had always been in color. And back in the 80s when everything had been black and white, the seniors seemed determined to show off how amazing they were by wearing the brightest colors possible.

Just about everyone's picture had been signed. This was back when you got your yearbook before graduation instead of the fall of next year, which, by that point, you probably never wanted to see your graduating class again.

Then I saw something that caught my eye. And I decided it was a good idea to show someone else, just to make sure I wasn't imagining it. And who better than the person sitting all by themselves?

I walked across the library to Grover Underwood, who was frantically working on his late math homework. "Grover, look at this," I said, shoving the yearbook on top of his stuff and pointing to a picture. "Who does that look like?"

Grover squinted at the picture while I tapped my fingers impatiently. "Dean King…umm…I don't know. Who is he supposed to look like?"

"Think our class."

Grover looked for a few more seconds. "Uhh, I guess he kind of looks like Percy?"

"Kind of?" I said loudly enough that the librarian shot me a glare. "They look exactly alike."

I took the yearbook back and studied it for a second. Dean King's picture had little hearts drawn around it, and there was a big lipstick kiss mark next to it.

All of the sudden, it clicked. Percy looked like this guy. Assuming this was her yearbook, Mrs. M obviously had liked this guy. And Mrs. M had been obsessed with Percy. "Go get the library's copy of the yearbook," I ordered Grover. He did what I asked without asking questions.

I flipped to the last page as soon as he handed it to me. It had been a tradition since the first yearbook came out that the senior couples write their initials on the inside of the back cover and tape in a picture of themselves. No one knew who started it, but the seniors loved doing it.

Right in a giant red heart: GM + DK. A picture taken from the back of a couple holding hands walking down the hallway was next to it. I immediately flipped back to the stolen yearbook and looked at the M's.

Grover, who had been silently watching me, was the first one to speak. "Gorganna Medusen. That's Mrs. M."

We looked at each other for a second.

"You don't think that she…" I started.

"She can't be crazy enough to…"

"Kidnap Percy?" I finished.

Grover was silent for a few seconds. Then he looked at me, this determined look in his eyes. "We have to go to the public library after school."

"Why?"

"If anyone knows anything about those two, it'll be the Fayte sisters."

So that was how I ended up at the public library after school with Grover, both yearbooks tucked in my backpack. "You really think they'll know something?" I whispered as we made our way to the resource center. "I mean, half the time they don't even know what day it is."

The Fayte sisters had been running the library as long as anyone could remember. The three old women knew everything about everyone, and they loved gossiping.

Admittedly, Grover had been really smart to think of coming here.

"Hello, children. What can we help you with?" the sister sitting in the middle behind the desk asked us, peering through her thick glasses. She barely had any hair left, but the few curls she had were combed and spread across her scalp in a desperate attempt to hide it.

"We have a few questions about some people who graduated Shallow Lake in 1988," I said, feeling the need to whisper, even though Mrs. M wasn't anywhere to be seen.

"Oh, 88 was a great year," said the sister on the right. It was obvious that she was wearing dentures. "Well, until Ronald King…" She touched her heart. "God rest his soul."

"Such mysterious circumstances, too," the one on the left said. She was wearing way too much makeup. She looked like a clown. "One day he's fine, and the next he's in the hospital with a terrible case of food poisoning."

"It was awfully strange how the younger brother just got up and left. I don't think he was even at the funeral," Glasses said. "What was his name? Dean?"

Grover and I were both standing there in awe, amazed they were making our job so easy.

"And then Junius was able to step right up into the lead position of the company," Dentures added. "Oh, now he was such a nice boy. So well-mannered and giving. I helped him organize his campaign for mayor."

"We know," the other two said in unison.

"What about Gorgonna Medusen? Were she and Dean…together?" I prodded.

The middle sister swooned. "Oh, God yes. They even got engaged their senior year of high school. And it was such a pretty ring. A blue diamond with all these little opals, and…."

"Of course, we thought they were too young," the one who looked like a clown said. "But you know, if anyone could make it, it was them."

"And what happened?" Grover pushed.

"Well, no one knows," they all said together.

"What do you mean?"

"No one knows what happened to Dean after he left," the middle sister leaned forward, whispering. "It's like he just….disappeared."


	26. Confessions and Obsessions

[Disclaimer] Contains lyrics from the song Nothing. Sorry, A Chorus Line. I don't own your lovely music.

Percy's English teacher finally jumped off the deep end and abducted him at Victoria's Secret. Yeah, you read that right. She thinks he'll get his dad to rescue him. He doesn't know his dad. Things are gonna get interesting…fast.  
Mr. Sol hit on Bianca before their Christmas concert. And now she's got a date or something with him. She was going to explain to Thalia, but the timing wasn't right. You just don't talk about your love life when a hormonal pregnant girl is upset.  
Speaking of Thalia, she's got double trouble on the way. Twins. She was going to tell Luke, but he punched her and that was the end of that. She's now decided on adoption.  
Things seemed to be going great for Luke and Silena, but he can't seem to get Thalia off his mind. Silena's on his mom's good side though, especially since she told her about Thalia's "abortion." Luke's mom really hates Thalia.  
Grover and Annabeth are on to Mrs. M and maybe, just maybe will be able to find Percy. But will they be too late? Duh duh duh…..

And that's what you've missed. ;)

**Chapter Twenty-Six  
****Confessions and Obsessions**

I knew something was wrong when my mom asked if she could come into my room instead of just barging in screaming. "You busy, Luke?" she asked, hovering at the door.

I had a bad feeling about this. "No."

She slowly stepped into my room and sat down on my bed across from me. I tossed my chem book aside – I'd been trying to study, but what was the point? There was no way I was going to pass this semester. Maybe that was what she wanted to talk about.

"Were you going to tell me about Thalia and…the pregnancy?" Mom asked in a tone I'd never heard her use before. It was soft and…maybe hurt?

"Can we talk about this later? I have a chemistry test that I'm trying to study for and it's been a long day and I really don't want to-" I started, trying to brush her off.

"Luke." A hint of irritation crept into her voice.

I pulled my knees to my chest and looked down. Talking about it made me feel like puking…or screaming, or maybe both. It was easier to just ignore everything. "She didn't tell me, Mom. She just got rid of it and wasn't ever going to tell me." It. A baby. I pushed the thought out of my mind.

Mom was quiet for a long time. "I wish you'd felt like you could tell me," she finally said. "You're only 16, Luke. It's a lot to deal with by yourself."

I knew how to respond to shouting. I didn't know how to respond to…this. "Yeah, well, it's done and taken care of. There's nothing I can do to change it – nothing to talk about." The words were hard to force out. "I didn't want to talk about it then, and I don't want to talk about it now."

Mom chose her words carefully. "I don't think you want to, but I think you need to."

"What am I supposed to say, Mom?" I knew I was shouting, but I didn't care. "That I wish she'd told me so I could talk her out of the abortion and raise a baby with her? That I can't look at her without feeling guilty for what she did? Because I can't stop thinking about it, Mom. I'm trying not to, but it's impossible." I didn't realize the words were true before I'd said them.

Slowly, Mom reached out and wrapped her arms around me. It was the first time she'd hugged me since I was a little kid. Any other time, I wouldn't have let her touch me, but I couldn't bring myself to care. "You know I love you, Luke," she said softly. "I don't always agree with what you do, but I want you to be able to talk to me."

I didn't say anything. I mean, I wasn't sure what to say. Something was wrong with my mom, that was for sure.

"Why don't we start over?" she asked.

"I think it's too late to start over, Mom."

She pretended not to hear me. "No more secrets. No more lies. No more…Thalia."

Eventually Mom figured out that she wasn't going to answer her. "Just think about it, Luke." She walked out of my room and lingered at the door for a second. "She did the right thing, you know. Neither of you are ready to be parents…especially not with each other."

I grabbed my textbook and pretended not to hear her, making a point of not looking in her direction until I was sure she was gone. Once she was, I got up and slammed the door. I grabbed my phone and sent a text to Silena.

_Why did you tell her?_

Her response came a few seconds later. _I'm sorry. I thought she knew._

_Is it that hard to keep your mouth shut?_

_I'm sorry._

_Whatever. Don't care. Bitch. I shut the phone off._

I wanted to throw the phone at the wall just to watch it break into a million pieces. I wanted my mom to come back and shout at me so I'd have someone to be angry at. I wanted to talk to Thalia.

I wanted her back.

* * *

So I suppose I have some catching up to do before I tell you about how I was making out with my music teacher in the front of his car. These things don't just happen.

It started last week when I showed up early for jazz choir so I could run through my solo a few times with the piano part. Music festival was less than a month away. I was going to have to get over the fact that I hated Mr. Sol sooner or later.

Okay, maybe hated wasn't the right word.

He was waiting for me, sitting on the piano bench with the sheet music all ready. "Okay, well…let's do this. Tell me if I'm going too fast or too slow…" His cheeks turned bright red, and I knew I probably looked the same way. "And we'll go from there."

"Whatever." I cleared my throat. The thing I didn't like about Nothing was that it started out with the actress giving a speech. No piano notes you could fall back on. It was just plain and simple acting for an entire terrifying 30 seconds.

"I'm so excited, because I'm gonna go to the High School of Performing Arts." I cleared my throat again. "I mean, I was dying to be a serious actress. Anyway, it's the first day of acting class and-"

"Bianca. You sound like one of those girls who's all oh, yeah, I'm excited but I'm rich and spoiled so really, I don't care. You've gotta make your judge believe that you really are a desperate actress who just wants to please her teacher."

An awkward silence hung in the air.

"Okay, that came out wrong," he stumbled. "I mean, I didn't mean it like that, but you know…"

"How about we just skip the introduction for today?"

He shook his head and played the opening chords. I tried to ignore the nervous feeling in my stomach. "Every day for a week we would try to-"

"You're nervous." He stopped playing.

"Well, excuse me if I'm not super comfortable around you," I retorted.

He stood up and tucked the piano bench in. I took a few steps back, then found myself pressed against a wall…with Mr. Sol pressed right up against me. The nervous feeling had increased exponentially, but another part of me felt…excited? God, no. I was not feeling this way about my music teacher.

But I had to admit, he was kind of amazing looking. His sandy blonde hair hung into his green eyes, which were intensely staring at me. "Well, I guess we'll just have to fix that," he whispered, cupping my face in his hands.

And then because I didn't say anything, I guess he assumed he could go for it. His mouth was on mine, and I didn't push him away. I'd never kissed a guy like this – maybe college was finally when they grew up and figured out how to make out without slobbering all over a girl.

Mr. Sol reached a hand up my shirt, and then I realized, I was making out with my teacher, and I didn't even know his first name. I imagined telling Thalia that I'd kissed Mr. Sol. It made the whole thing sound so…dirty. I couldn't help but laugh.

He slid away from me, looking hurt. "What?"

"It's just…I was just thinking…I don't even know your first name." So, it sounded lame out loud. And it made me sound like I was about six years old. Way to go, Bianca.

He gave me a half smirk. "Cyrus."

"Okay, Cyrus…" I tested out the sound of it.

"Yes, Bianca?" He licked his lips, and I noticed that some of my lip gloss had rubbed off on him. My stomach did a little flip. My God, I was pathetic. Something needed to be done.

"Yeah, this is great, but…" I stuck a hand on my hip and tried to fake the confidence I definitely wasn't feeling right now. "I don't mess around with people who aren't ready to get serious."

He just shrugged. "Okay. I'll pick you up Saturday at seven."

"And what are we going to do?"

"That's a surprise." He winked.

So I'd tried to tell Thalia, but she obviously hadn't been in the mood to listen to someone go on about how great their life was when hers obviously…sucked. So Mr. Sol – it was too weird to think of him as Cyrus – was my secret.

I could go on about how I'd obsessed about what to wear and how to do my hair, but let's make this story short. He was twenty minutes late and didn't offer any excuses. I could tell he was stressed about something. When I'd asked him what was on his mind, he'd cryptically answered _stuff_.

He was quiet until he pulled into the parking lot of some little restaurant. "I hope you like Italian food," he said.

"Yeah, well, we're not going to eat here," I said, watching as the Stoll brothers popped out of a car on the other side of the parking lot, each holding the door open for a Gardner twin. Any other day, I would have laughed and thought of some snarky comment about how perfect it was. "People from school are here."

"Shit." Mr. Sol shook his head. "I didn't even think…I mean, I realized it was probably better to go to another town, but I didn't…"

"It's okay," I interrupted. "I got sick of waiting for you and ate like, a whole bag of Doritos before you picked me up so I'm not even that hungry." Real attractive, Bianca.

"Did I mention I'm sorry for being late?"

"You could a few more times before it gets old."

"Some first date, huh?" he said, pulling out of the parking lot.

"Yeah. Whatever. Just take me home."

At a stop sign, he stopped for way longer than the required five seconds. "What are you waiting for?" I asked, sounding a little bitchier than I'd intended.

I heard him unbuckle his seatbelt, then felt him lean over me. His breath was hot on my neck. "I'm okay with waiting if you are."

My stomach did another one of those flips. My God, I really was going to need to work on that. "Well, you might be waiting a very, very long time." I hoped he was smart enough to realize I wasn't talking about the stop sign.

"We can go slow if that's what you want."

And that's how I'd ended up making out with him in the front of his car. And the funny thing is, it was probably about twenty minutes before someone finally pulled up behind us and blared their horn. I couldn't stop laughing, and neither could he.

I insisted he dropped me off a block away from my house on the off chance my dad was watching. "We should do this again soon," he said.

"Yeah. Try not to show up late…Cyrus."

"I'll try, Bianca."

I couldn't wait.

Kill me.

* * *

No matter how many times I woke up captured and tied to a chair, I never remembered where I was for the first few seconds.

And then it would all hit me.

Today my head felt like it was being split open. Half of my face was covered with dried blood, and my right eye was swollen shut. I briefly remembered Mrs. M shouting about how impatient she was getting before throwing something at me.

It had been a little over three weeks. I was starting to give up on anyone finding me. And honestly, if I was in her shoes, I'd get the point that by now, the poor kid I'd abducted really didn't know his dad. Because if I did, I gladly would have passed her onto him a long time ago.

Sometimes I wondered how my mom was doing. I knew she was probably worried sick, but at least she had the baby if I didn't get out of this. I hoped Gabe wasn't being too big of a jerk to her, then realized that was a hopeless cause.

Another thing – whenever I heard the front door click open, my skin always crawled. Mrs. M entered the room a few seconds later. She was frantic…well, more than usual. "Someone stole the yearbook!" she shrieked.

"That sucks." My voice was hoarse.

Mrs. M turned on me, and I immediately wished I'd kept my mouth shut. She cupped my face in her hands and forced me to look at me. "You know what that means? Someone could figure me out. Someone could…find you."

"Wouldn't that be terrible?"

She dug her nails into my skin. "I could kill you. I don't want to, but…if you won't tell me where your father is, it might be the only way to get rid of you."

I knew immediately that she would kill me without thinking twice about it. She was that crazy. "Someone would find out." My voice shook.

"Oh, I don't think so. There are plenty of ways to get rid of a body." She began pacing. "I could burn it and dump the ashes in the river. Wouldn't that be just perfect? He always loved the water so much. A bit too much, if you ask me, but-"

"Don't you get it? I don't know him! Just let me go. I promise, I won't tell anyone it was you. Just let me go!"

"Shut up!" she hissed, raking her nails across my face. "You either get your dad to get you out of here…or you don't get out of here at all."

"What's your problem? So what, you're obsessed with some guy from high school. Get over it."

"Some guy from high school? Dean and I were going to get married!" she shouted. "Admittedly, I might have stretched the truth to get to that point, but…he left me! He left everyone who cared about him. No note, no apology, no nothing. Do you know what that's like? Of course you don't, because you're a stupid little child, just like he was."

I would have felt bad for Dean King if he wasn't the reason I was locked in a room with a crazy lady. "Most people like, you know, move on with their lives. You should try it." I was screwed anyway.

"He was my life!" She wrapped her hands around my neck and started shaking me. "You don't understand – no one understands! I need him. I need-"

Everything went black.

The next time I woke up, it was the same first few seconds of confusion. Only this time, instead of waking up to an empty room, there was someone there with me. And my honest to God first thought: Holy crap. I'm hallucinating now.

"Annabeth?" I asked, not letting myself believe that she was really there right in front of me.

She grinned. "Come on, we have to hurry up. I don't know how much longer she's going to be gone."


	27. Up In Flames

**Chapter Twenty-Seven  
****Up in Flames**

Do you remember way back when we were stuck at that stupid hotel and I told you about how my mom was from Puerto Rico and my dad was a soldier? Well, you probably remember me being angry at Chris more than anything – and speaking of him, he's still not forgiven.

But this Saturday morning, not even Chris Rodriguez could ruin my mood. And you want to know why? Well, when I came downstairs for breakfast, my mom was smiling, the home phone sitting in her lap. "El tres de marzo," she said, beaming.

Yes, my mom did speak English, but when she was mad, or excited, or maybe just when she forgot we were in America, she regressed back to her native language. Normally, I would have snapped at her about speaking in English, but…

"Really? Dad's coming home in less than two months?" I asked. My mom eagerly shook her head before standing up and wrapping me in a big hug. Again, normally I would have snapped at her about how she was acting like I was a little kid, and I didn't like it when she touched me, but my dad was coming home. I hadn't seen him in over a year.

I felt Mom shaking, and I knew she was crying. Ever since she'd married Dad, it'd been one tour after the other, always with the promise of this'll be the last one. And each time, she believed him. In his defense, I think he honestly meant it each time. But then there would be some new place, some new fight, and he would be gone again.

The worst time had been when I was eight years old. On September 11, 2001, I knew something was wrong when I got home from school and my mom was watching TV, crying. "Papá va a salir," she'd whispered. Daddy's going to leave.

And for the last ten years, I'd seen my dad for a collective total of four months. I knew I shouldn't get my hopes up, but I couldn't help but hope that this was going to be it. The time when he finally stayed home.

But of course, we didn't say anything. It was bad luck to mention it, we'd decided.

"He'll miss all of my basketball games," I said. Okay, I was the only sophomore on the varsity team. Excuse me for wanting my dad to see.

"But he'll be here for all of your softball season this year," Mom added. "I think we need to celebrate. Huevos rancheros?" And just like that, she changed the topic. She was good at that, being really positive about all things involving Dad. But I knew she cried herself to sleep for the first few weeks every time he left, and she got up at the crack of dawn to watch the news every day.

"Sure, Mom."

She retreated into the kitchen, happily singing some Spanish song way off key. I raced back upstairs, grabbing my phone to tell someone, but then I remembered the battery had died last night on the way to our basketball game. I grabbed my charger and plugged it in, waiting for my phone to power up.

When it finally did, I had a few messages from the older basketball players telling me I'd played really good last night, one from Chris, gloating about how the guys had killed the team they played, and no less than 18 messages from Silena.

I sent Chris a quick message about keeping his eye on their star center. If you believed everything you heard, it sounded like the Gardner twins had a thing for the Stoll brothers. Then I braced myself for whatever was going on with Silena.

_I need to talk to you. Where are you? Please talk to me. I'm sorry I was a bitch about the Chris thing. I really need to talk to you._ Those messages went on for a little while longer. _Luke thinks I'm a bitch. I don't know what to do. Will you please talk to me? He hates me. Come on, I need you right now._

My great mood was gone. _Do you want me to come over? My phone died last night._

Even though her last message had come sometime last night, she responded in just a few minutes. _Yes. Bring ice cream. And a sad movie._

I changed out of my pajamas into sweats and an old shirt from some softball camp. While I was tying my hair up, my phone vibrated again. I groaned, expecting another message from Silena. Instead, it was a message from Chris.

_Travis can do what he wants. You seem mad._

_No shit._ I probably should have left it at that. I didn't. _I have to go talk to Silena because your old best friend thinks she's a bitch or something._

_She is a bitch. Wait, you mean Luke?_

I wanted to ask him if he was blind and had missed their constant love fest for the past month. _Yeah. I have to go._

I was ready to go back downstairs and have breakfast with my mom, then drive to Silena's house and play the sympathetic friend for a while. Then my phone vibrated again. I was about ready to shut the damn thing off and throw it out the window.

_Do you want to ditch Silena and hang out today?_

I thought about it for all of two seconds. Chris Rodriguez or a weepy miserable Silena Beauregard. I texted Silena. _Sorry. Something just came up. Family emergency. I'll talk to you later_. Then I texted Chris, telling him to pick me up in 15 minutes.

Mom had the eggs on the table by the time I came back down. I told her I was going to hang out with a friend today to celebrate, and she didn't ask any questions. Instead, she went on about how this year we could take a family vacation this summer, and how Dad would be so proud when he saw how great the softball team was, and I quit listening after that, only hoping that she wouldn't be disappointed if things didn't work out so perfectly.

When I saw Chris' crappy old car pull into our driveway, I ran upstairs to grab my phone. I figured I had enough of a battery to last a few hours. I was all prepared to run out the door to his car, but he surprised me by coming up to the door.

"You didn't tell me it was a boy, Clarisse," Mom said before I opened the door, but her tone told me she wasn't mad. "He's…muy guapo." She winked. Times like these made me wonder if my mom didn't wish she had a girlier daughter. I pushed the thought out of my mind.

Chris was wearing an old Shallow Lake Trojans sweatshirt. Yes, Trojans. Every year a group of conservative parents tried to get it changed, but the students liked all of the old traditions that came with it – like stuffing one lucky football player's locker full of condoms before every home game in the fall.

"Heard you guys won last night," Chris threw me a smile. "And you led the team for points. Nice job."

"Yeah, and a modest little angel told me his team killed last night. Nice job." I pushed past him and headed for his car. It was a sore spot between the really competitive athletes – the boys were undefeated, but the girls had lost one game. And that was because the refs had seriously hated us.

Chris slid into the driver's seat. Even though it was probably from the 80s, his car still had that fresh off the lot smell. And there weren't any discarded fast food bags on the ground or anything. It had impressed me the first time I'd been in his car, and I guess it still did.

"You care where we go?" he asked. I shook my head. "So you blame me for Silena being all hung up over Luke."

I snorted. "No. All I said is he was your best friend."

"He's a loser."

"I'm not arguing."

"I don't get why girls like him so much."

"Me either."

"He's a complete asswipe. And he doesn't care about anything. He's the kind of person who would jump off a cliff just to-"

"I don't get how you guys were ever friends if you hate him so much," I interrupted.

Chris was quiet for a long time. "We were lab partners in biology. I fell asleep one time. Well, a couple times. One time he woke me up and told me if I was having a hard time staying awake, he'd sell me some of his Adderall. He must have had it for like, ADHD or something."

"Doesn't seem to be helping him."

"He told me he didn't like taking it, so he normally just drains it down the sink so his mom won't freak out. I asked him if it would show up in a drug test. He asked me why I cared." Chris tapped his fingers on the wheel as we came to a stop sign. "I guess I was stupid. I wanted to be around someone who could be so careless, when I always have to…anyway, I finally realized that he's going nowhere."

"There's more than that."

"Yeah. There is."

Chris turned into a familiar driveway. "Wait, why are we going to see Silena?" I asked.

"Because you made me feel bad for her."

"But you said she's a bitch."

"Not relevant."

He parked the car and walked around to open my door for me like the gentleman he wasn't. "Let's just be nice. Be supportive. Maybe subtly coax her into breaking up with Luke."

I guessed I could work with him for that cause.

But that didn't mean I still liked him.

* * *

I never thought that when Grover Underwood asked me for a ride, it would lead to us sitting in my car two days later, watching as a building exploded. I mean, yeah, I'm cynical.

But even I'm not that cynical.

So like I said, this all started when Grover came up to me before first hour. "Hey, Thalia," he said timidly, already giving me the pleading look with his big brown eyes. "Will you give me and Annabeth a ride somewhere after school?"

"Somewhere?" When it came to driving, I avoided places I'd never been before and trips longer than an hour. And I swear it had nothing to do with the fact that my mom had died in a car accident. Or at least that's what I told myself.

"Well, umm..you see…" This is where Grover went from kind of anxious to really nervous. "We need you to follow someone."

"Who?" I pushed him when it was obvious he wasn't going to say anything more.

"Mrs. M," he mumbled, then added something that I couldn't hear.

"You're mumbling."

"We think she…."

"Louder."

"She's the one who kidnapped Percy," Grover whispered.

Right then, the two minute bell rang. "Explain during lunch. I'm not saying no, but I'll think about it, okay?"

Grover nodded and ran off to his first class of the day. And I slowly made my way to algebra – my least favorite class of the day solely because I had to sit next to…Luke. I just pretended he didn't exist, and he did the same for me.

Well, he had up until today. I took my seat next to him and consciously made an effort to suck my stomach in. I mean, it was definitely there. Small, but there. I needed to ask my grandpa if I could live in Florida with him for the next six months.

"Hey, Thalia," he said, giving me the tiniest hint of a smile. I ignored him and took my time opening my book so I had something to do. I didn't have to look to know that he was watching me.

"What do you want, Luke?" I finally asked, struggling to keep my voice neutral.

I was eternally thankful that the final bell rang right then and the teacher stepped up to her little podium and started lecturing immediately. I tried to listen, but honestly, stuff like math and science made no sense to me. My guidance counselor in California had pointed out that I was a lot better in my social studies classes and put me in a bunch of advanced ones, but unfortunately, Shallow Lake didn't have any of that.

Luke managed to pass me a note so subtly even I almost didn't see him do it. _Truce?_ he'd written in his familiar blocky handwriting.

I grabbed my red pen. _Hell no._ Just for added emphasis, I outlined it a few times.

He passed the paper back to me a few minutes later. _Why not? I messed up. You messed up. We're even._

_We are NOT even._

_How do you figure?_

Maybe because I was 14 weeks pregnant and planning on never telling him, instead opting to hand our twins over to some couple who was actually happy together. _Whatever. Truce. You win._

I hoped that would be the end of everything. Instead, the note was right back on my desk less than a minute later. _Cool. You want a ride home from school today? I know you don't like driving._

_I don't mind driving._ And I'm busy. And because I knew what his next question would be, I added, _Grover Underwood and Annabeth Chase need a ride somewhere. Now stop talking to me. Unlike you, I want to graduate sometime this century._

Grades were always posted on this bulletin in the back of the classroom. It didn't actually have your name – they actually used your "student code," which was just your graduation year followed by your birthday. It wasn't too hard to figure out who was who. And Luke's grade…well, acing the semester final wouldn't do him much good at this point.

The rest of algebra went smoothly – well, as smoothly as logarithms could go. If anything, this was going to be the class that ruined my straight B average. But then again, I'd rather be failing all of my classes than be expecting twins in six months. At least I could get myself out of the first situation.

I really had to quit thinking like that.

I took my time leaving when the bell rang, but Luke waited right outside of the door for me. I gritted my teeth. "Seriously, what do you want?"

"Nothing," he insisted. We started walking down the hallway, and his arm brushed mine. I waited for his girlfriend to jump out of a locker and attack us both. "I just feel bad about…everything."

"Yeah, well get over it. I did. You should try it."

He stopped and tugged on my wrist. "Really? Can you look me in the eye and tell me that you're over everything? That you don't ever think about it? That you don't wonder…what if?"

Between the look he was giving me and the desperate way he was pleading with me, this really small part of me wanted to tell him. Yeah, that would go over really well. "No, I don't. I'm over it. And I think it'd be best if you didn't talk to me until you were too."

And by then, I'd hopefully be on a completely different side of the country.

It was hard to forget our conversation. The next four hours, I kept replaying it in my head, wondering how bad it would have gone if I'd told him right then and there. Then I convinced myself that it was just some act he was putting on. He really didn't care. And if he did, then it was better that he didn't know.

Lunch came. Despite being super hungry, I had the feeling that anything I ate would come right back up. I completely forgot that I was going to talk to Grover until he and Annabeth sat down on either side of me.

"So Grover told you," Annabeth said. It was the first time she'd talked to me since I got back, and for some reason, she wouldn't look me in the eyes.

"He told me you think your English teacher abducted Percy."

"She's obsessed with Percy because he looks like Dean King, and they were like, engaged," Grover blurted out. "Their picture is on the back page of the yearbook in the library."

"Percy looks like Dean King, who was engaged to Mrs. M. Therefore, Mrs. M is the one who kidnapped Percy. Yeah, you guys have got this all figured out." I couldn't keep the sarcasm out of my voice. "I can see why you haven't gone to the police with this theory yet."

Annabeth ignored me. "So we want you to follow her home, just so we can figure out where she lives. They don't keep the addresses of substitute teachers on file. I checked."

"You broke into the office's records?"

She shrugged. "It wasn't hard. I said I had a headache. I waited for the secretary to walk away for a few minutes. Then I went and looked. And the weird thing is they don't have anything about her."

So maybe I had a newfound respect for her. Or maybe I just needed a distraction. "Okay. We can follow her. But that's all we're going to do. Understand?"

They both agreed. And that was how we found ourselves following this complete crap shack of a van through the busy traffic in Degis. "Don't follow her too close. No, don't get too far behind her. We might lose her if we don't-"

"Annabeth. Shut up." My knuckles were white from gripping the steering wheel so hard. Mrs. M seemed to be taking the most indirect route possible, almost like she knew we were following her. I was thankful the sporty car Nell had given me the keys to tinted windows.

Grover was sitting in the backseat nervously. "I don't think this a good idea," he bleated.

Yeah, I'd thought that twenty minutes ago. Mrs. M put on her blinker and turned on a road that led to one of the poorer parts of the city. "Are we still following her?"

"Yes," Annabeth said, right as Grover protested. "Come on, we've come this far." Sighing, I put on my blinker and followed her. It was getting really hard to follow her, because first, there weren't many people in this part of town. It had a reputation. And second, when you were driving a sports car that wasn't even three years old, you kind of stuck out.

Finally, she stopped outside of this building that seriously looked like it was up for demolition. It looked like it had been built in the early 1900s, and no renovation work had been done since. Some of the windows were missing glass, and I swear the entire thing looked like it was leaning to the left.

"Okay, we know where she lives. Let's go," Grover said. I was happy to oblige.

"No, wait," Annabeth insisted.

"What am I supposed to do? Park here? That won't set off any red flags on her part." I settled for slowing down. Annabeth watched the building. I didn't know what she was looking for until lights flickered on one of the floors.

"She's got an apartment on the second floor," Annabeth said. I had to admit, that girl was smart.

As we were driving back home, I asked, "You guys really think she's the one who kidnapped him?"

"Yes," they both said immediately.

"Okay, here's what we're going to do."

That's how that Saturday, I ended up outside Luke Castellan's house, handing him the keys to my Grand Prix. "Thanks for doing this," I said as he handed me the keys to his old Fiero.

"Yeah, well, trading your fancy ass car for my hunk of crap. It's not like I'm doing you a huge favor."

He loved his car. Something about the headlights that popped out and the sunroof made it perfect in his eyes. "You are. Thanks. I'll bring it back later tonight."

Our eyes met for just a second. Then he started leaning into me, and I knew where things were headed, so I quickly turned and headed to his car. "But yeah, I really have to go."

"Sometimes the accelerator sticks," he warned. "And if it doesn't start right away, all you have to do is pound on the hood a little bit and it should. And if that doesn't work, you can call me. You know that, right?"

"Yeah." Luke hadn't even asked me why I needed to exchange cars. I'd just texted him, asked, and he'd agreed. "Thanks again."

He shook his head and headed back into his house. I wondered how he'd explain the new car to his mom, then quickly stopped. It wasn't my problem. He wasn't my problem.

Annabeth's eyes nearly popped out of her head when I picked her up. "This is Luke's car," she sputtered.

"Yeah? It is. Got a problem with that? I asked him to switch with me, just in case Mrs. M remembers us."

She shook her head. "Yeah, good idea." And just like that, her composure was back.

And that's when it hit me. "Annabeth, you don't…like Luke, do you?"

Her face turned bright red, which pretty much answered my question. "No. I mean, why would I?"

"I don't know. Just asking."

We picked up Grover a few minutes later. He looked nervous. "Hey, isn't this-"

"Luke's car? Yes. We switched so Mrs. M wouldn't remember us."

Something Luke forgot to mention about his car: the heating was bipolar. I had it cranked all the way up, and all of the sudden freezing cold air started blowing out. We weren't even halfway to Degis, and we were all freezing.

"Thalia, can you t-t-turn the heating on?" Grover asked, his teeth chattering.

"It is on."

Annabeth fiddled with the dial, but the car seemed hell-bent on freezing us. "It's what he gets for driving a car that's ten years older than he is." I rolled my eyes.

"I don't get why out of all the people in the world, you ask him to trade cars," Grover said. I tried to shoot him a look in the rearview mirror that was both pissed off and pleading. I was not talking about this now.

"Yeah, why-" Annabeth started.

"Let's just not talk."

But once we got to Degis, Annabeth had to give me directions back to the apartment building. So I hated driving, and I had no sense of direction. Maybe the two went together.

We pulled up in front of the apartment building. I put on a pair of oversized sunglasses and pulled the hood of my jacket up. Even if this lady wasn't a crazy kidnapper, she was definitely mental. I didn't want her knowing I'd helped two of her students stalk her.

"So what do we do now?" Grover asked.

"We wait," Annabeth and I said together.

We got lucky. A half hour later, Mrs. M came out of her house, got in the van, and drove off. "Remember the plan," I said.

"Go in. Look around. Find Percy. Get Percy. Get out as fast as possible," Annabeth recited.

"We'll call you if she comes back."

"Good luck," Grover added.

She shook her head and got out of the car. We watched her enter the doors, and then we waited.

"So, why did you ask Luke?" Grover finally asked.

"I don't know. It was convenient. And he's being nice to me. It's weird."

"So are you going to tell him?"

"No. I'm kind of thinking of moving to Florida for the next six months. My grandpa's there. And he knows. And then I could find some nice couple, do the…you know…adoption, and move on with my life." Out loud, it didn't sound half as good, or realistic.

"You think that would…oh man." Grover said, his eyes widening as the van pulled back up. Mrs. M got out, and she was holding…tanks of gas?

"Duck," I told him. She wouldn't recognize me, but he'd be a dead giveaway that something was up. I immediately pulled out my phone and called Annabeth. She didn't pick up. Then I heard something vibrating. I reached down into the crack of the passenger seat, and sure enough.

"Dammit!" I swore, holding her phone in my hand. "Grover, what do we do?"

He peeked his head back up. "Call the police?"

"And what if this is nothing?"

"But what if she's some creepy axe murder and kills Annabeth?"

"But what about-"

We heard this giant explosion and both looked at the building.

The entire second floor was on fire.

"Think we should-"

"Calling the police right now."

* * *

I ran up the stairs with a speed that was almost superhuman. I felt this rush of adrenaline kick in, and I realized I was excited. I wanted to be the girl who found Percy Jackson. Now that would impress an Ivy League college.

The way the building was set up, it seemed like each floor was its own apartment, but it didn't seem like too many other people were living here. If they did, they either were all on vacation, or they were awfully quiet. My footsteps seemed way too loud.

Predictably, the door to the second floor was locked, but I'd done my research. I pulled out my dad's credit card and messed with the lock a little bit. Thankfully, it clicked open after a few seconds. The room it opened up to was pretty bare. There was a refrigerator, a table, and a couple cabinets. It smelled like something was rotting.

Oh God. I hoped it wasn't a dead body.

From there, the little kitchen merged into a little living room. Again, there wasn't really anything to show that this place was lived in. I wondered if she was even legally living here. It didn't seem like the landlord came by all that much. Seriously, the building was a dump.

There was a little hallway. The first door, which was hanging open, revealed a small bathroom. There wasn't even a toothbrush there. The other door that was open led into a bedroom. The sheets were perfectly made on the bed, and the pillows straightened perfectly. But that wasn't what caught my attention.

An entire wall was covered with photographs. Of her. Of Dean King. Of her and Dean King together. But what scared me the most was one that had been tacked on top of the others – it must have been Percy's school picture. There was an X drawn over his face, and darts were covering it. I reached into my pocket to grab my phone so I could take a picture, but then I realized it was gone.

I darted out of that room and faced the last door. Taking a deep breath, I opened it.

The room was dark, so without thinking, I flipped the light on. There was nothing but a little bed and dresser, and an unconscious teenager tied to a chair.

He was here. He was alive.

I wanted to jump up and down and scream in excitement, but that could wait. First, I needed to get him out of here.

Every inch of bare skin was covered with bruises, and his right eye was swollen so badly I doubted he could open it. Blood was caked in his hair where there was a deep gash that probably would need stitches.

I grabbed the pocketknife I'd swiped from my dad (I'm sure he'd understand that and the credit card once he knew the circumstances) and quickly sliced through the ropes on his hands that kept him bound to the chair. Then I didn't know what to do. Did I wake him up? Did I just try and carry him back to the car?

Fortunately, he woke up right then. "Annabeth?" he asked.

I smirked. "Come on, we have to hurry up. I don't know how much longer she's going to be gone."

He stood up, but his legs wouldn't hold him. I rushed over to him and caught him before he fell. "I…it's been a month…and I've been stuck here…and…I'm not gonna be able to walk," he said, sounding scared and hopeless.

"Yes, you can." I put his arm over my shoulders. "Come on, just lean on me."

We took a few steps, but they were at an agonizingly slow pace. I hoped Mrs. M wasn't coming back any time soon.

My heart sank when I heard the door slam. "Oh, Percy. I'm back, and I have a surprise for you!"

His eyes grew wide with fear, and he suddenly looked a lot like one of those dogs you see in the commercials trying to raise money for abused animals. As quickly as I could, I set him back in the chair. "Act normal," I whispered, looking for somewhere to go before deciding the only place was under the bed.

I saw her feet walk into the room, and I could faintly smell some chemical, but it wasn't strong enough to place. "I'm here to give you your final choice." Her voice had this crazy lilt to it. "Call your dad and get him to help you right now, or you're going to die."

I couldn't help but gasp. Grover and I had been right!

"I'm telling you, I don't know him. Please, just let me go."

I saw her walk around the room and heard her pour fluid all over the floor.

Gasoline.

"I'll light this whole place on fire and we'll die together. Won't that be sweet?" She laughed. "I can't live without him, and you don't deserve to live if you're hiding him from me."

"You're insane!" Percy shouted.

"Don't ever call me that!" she roared and stomped over to him. I couldn't see what happened next, but I heard her pouring gasoline, and couldn't see it hit the floor, so she was…pouring it on him?

Using the element of surprise, which was probably the only advantage we were going to have, I wiggled out from under the bed and hit her on the back of the head as hard as I could. She stumbled for a few seconds before turning to face me.

"You. Just like your damn mother, always getting involved where you're not welcome." She tried to grab me, but I ducked and found myself right next to Percy. His eyes were wide, and he was shaking. My adrenaline was pumping – I didn't even feel scared.

She lunged at me, and I pushed her away. She crumpled to the ground for a few seconds – I hadn't pushed her that hard, had I? I grabbed Percy told him to hold on. He swung his arms over my shoulders and I started running as fast as I could through her house. What had formerly seemed so small now seemed impossibly huge.

"You little bitch! I hate you! And I hate you, Percy Jackson! I hope you and your father rot in hell," she shouted from the bedroom. "I don't want to live without him. Why can't you just tell me where he is? I don't want to live without him!"

That was when she lit the place on fire.

I ran as fast as we could, not even thinking about what would happen if the fire caught up to us. We made it out of the apartment, the whole time hearing her haunting screams as she…as she…

She'd covered the stairs with gas, so we weren't safe yet. I ran as fast as I could, Percy clinging to me tightly.

We were down on the first floor when I heard an ear-shattering explosion. I slammed through the door before falling to the sidewalk. Suddenly, that adrenaline rush was gone, and I was just a scared teen. On some level, I realized that the apartment – maybe even the entire building – had blown up, and Mrs. M had been inside it.

"We have to go back. We have to go back!" Percy was insisting while Grover and Thalia held him back. "She's still in there!"

Stockholm Syndrome. I couldn't believe my brain was functioning well enough to be able to place what he was feeling.

"Percy, if she was in there, she's gone now," Thalia whispered gently. "You're okay now."

He pushed them both away and curled into a ball, crying. He was covered in gasoline and bruises – it made me wonder what I looked like.

Right before the cop cars arrived, Percy grabbed my arm and frantically told me, "We can't tell them about Dean King."

Thalia snorted. "Why the hell not? He's the reason that psycho abducted you."

"It's just…I know it's important." He grabbed my arm, digging his nails into my skin. "You agree with me, right?"

"If that's what you want." He'd been trapped with her for a month. He deserved to do whatever he wanted.

The police came. The fire department was called. They took statements from each of us. I was amazed at how easy it was to make up a lie – Grover and I were coming over to get help on a project, and we were hanging out with Thalia later, so she'd driven us. It wasn't like Mrs. M was around to contradict us.

Percy told them about how I'd found him, and then Mrs. M had torched the place. He told the police that she'd always been obsessed with him, but he had no idea why. His voice shook, and he was still shaking. I think it helped him get away with a less-than-convincing delivery. Still, the police looked at Grover, completely clean, with skeptical gazes.

Reporters were there immediately. The police tried to shoo them away, but not before they got a few pictures. It was only then that it occurred to me – Percy had at some point in all the chaos grabbed my hand, and he still hadn't let go.

And I guess after everything that had just happened, that was okay.


	28. PTSD

**Chapter Twenty-Eight  
****PTSD = Please Try [not to encourage] Self Denial**

Today was supposed to be the day I won Thalia back.

I had it all planned out – I would pick up Silena just like normal, break up with her on the ride to school (like it would be that easy), and then everything would be set. So I guess it wasn't all planned out – the actual winning her back was still kind of open, but I was confident I'd think of something.

Well, I thought I would until I woke up with a headache that made thinking kind of painful. I stumbled out of bed and got dressed, the whole time feeling sick. Mom was downstairs, making breakfast. "I'm working a later shift," she said by way of explanation. "And school was cancelled today – something about an investigation over that substitute teacher who abducted her student."

Thalia had told me about it when she'd dropped my car off on Saturday night, even though by then the story was all over the news. She'd been really brief and seemed kind of nervous. When I'd asked her about it, she'd snapped at me and told me it was none of my business.

"I'm not hungry," I said. To be honest, I was feeling kind of sick.

Mom put a lid on whatever she was cooking and looked at me. "You feeling okay? You look kind of pale." I shook my head, and she put a hand on my forehead. "You're burning up," she said, concerned. "I'm taking you in."

"You don't need to do that. It's just a headache and a fever."

"I won't feel good until you get checked out. Do it for me, okay?"

"Whatever." I kind of wanted to avoid an argument. My head already felt like it was about to explode.

A little over half an hour later, we were sitting in the waiting room at the clinic section of the hospital in Degis. I'd made Mom stop a few times on the drive over, during which I would get out of the car and puke. I was feeling worse and worse every minute.

The receptionist had greeted Mom warmly, going on about how she hadn't seen me since I was knee high to a grasshopper – whatever that meant. They talked for a few minutes about two of the doctors who were apparently getting married and how wedding invitations had gone out, and his ex-girlfriend (a doctor in the dermatology department) hadn't been invited. Big deal. I really just wanted to go back to sleep.

Mom was reading a People magazine that was at least four years old, so I figured it was safe to pull out my phone without her snooping.

_Remember when we were little and both got dumped by our moms at the hospital?_ I texted Thalia, then quickly put my phone in my pocket before Mom could see. Saturday night when I'd walked back in the house after talking to her, Mom hadn't shouted or anything, but she'd given me a look that clearly expressed her distaste.

When I was a little kid, my mom would try to find cheap babysitters, but there were times when no one was available, so she would drag me to work with her and tell me to play with the stuff in the waiting room and do my homework.

One day when I was in third grade, another girl came into the waiting room. A total milf of a woman was with her, and even though they looked nothing alike, you could tell that they were mother and daughter. "Okay, just stay here. I'll be done in a couple hours," she'd said and strode off.

I'd probably been staring or something, because she glared at me and asked, "Do you have a problem?"

"My mom dumped me here too."

"I don't care." She'd reached for one of the outdated magazines.

"Don't touch those unless you want to get mono or something. I'm Luke."

"Yeah? I'm Thalia. And I still don't care."

_Yeah. And then Nell ended up being our babysitter. Why are you thinking about that?_

_Because I'm at the clinic._

I was happy when her response came just a few seconds later. _What? Why?_

_I'm sick._

_No shit._

_I'll tell you what's wrong after I see the doctor._

_Okay._

I put my phone back in my pocket, and the nurse came to get us a few minutes later. She was overweight and her English was heavily accented. She talked with Mom as she took my height and weight, though I had no idea what she was saying.

"You know he should probably put on some weight," the nurse said once she'd balanced the scale. At least, that's what I thought she said. It was the same thing every nurse had said to me since I was a little kid – I'd always been underweight.

"He should. He won't." Mom shrugged, as if to say _what can you do? _"High metabolism and a small appetite."

"Or an eating disorder," I thought I heard the nurse say under her breath. I ignored her. She took us to a room, took my vitals, then told us a doctor would be in shortly.

The doctor was this old guy who seemed like he was in a hurry. He looked briefly at the sheet the nurse had filled out. "102 degrees. He's definitely got a fever," the doctor said. "Nausea, headache, fatigue…" He tapped his pen on his clipboard. "And this all started this morning?"

Mom nodded in agreement right as I said, "No. I started feeling sick…Saturday, I guess."

The doctor took a few notes. "Can you take off your shirt for me, Luke?"

"Whatever," I said, pulling it off. The doctor looked at me for a grand total of two seconds before sighing.

"He's got chickenpox."

The next few days were kind of a sick blur. I remember shouting at Mom a lot about how I hated her for not giving me the vaccine when I was little, and she just kept bringing me soup and cookies, but it wasn't like I could really keep anything down.

And it only got worse once the actual chickenpox really started forming. While I was sleeping, Mom cut my fingernails down to nothing. I probably screamed at her for that, but she just sighed and told me it would get better…eventually.

A few days later, she told me school was starting again, but I probably wouldn't be able to go back till the end of the month. She also told me she had to go to work, and that I should just watch TV or something and she'd come back as soon as she could.

During lunch, the doorbell rang. I threw a pillow over my head and tried to ignore it. It kept ringing, and finally I heard the door open. I probably should have been worried, but I was too sick to care.

The UPS guy walked down the hall, looking extremely uncomfortable. "Your mom…I dropped something off last night, and she gave me a key and asked if I would…check up on you. She's worried."

I sat up on the couch that had become my home over the last few days. "It's her fault. You'd think, being a nurse and all that shit, she'd have the brains to get me vaccinated when I was little. But I guess it's not all bad. My girlfriend – she's never had chickenpox, so I don't have to deal with her right now."

He grabbed the remote and turned the TV on. "The girl you didn't want to meet your mom?"

"Silena? Yeah." I'd been really surprised when he'd conveniently shown up at the right moment. I'd told him that my girlfriend was here to meet my mom, and I really didn't want to deal with it. He asked me if I wanted to _help him deliver something._ I'd jumped at the chance to get out of the house.

"So I take it things aren't going well with her."

"I just…I don't know."

"You still like the girl who got pregnant."

"How do you figure this stuff out?"

He shrugged uncomfortably and flipped through the channels. "Just intuition." He stopped on TLC. Cake Boss was on. I'd already seen the episode four times during my time at home. "I love this show," he confessed.

We watched them drop a seven-layer cake down the stairs and frantically try to make another one for a few minutes before I finally asked, "Mom just trusted you?"

"You could say we've known each other for a while."

"That sucks for you."

"You know…she's not so bad. She's just had a hard life."

I tried not to laugh. "I don't even know your name and suddenly you're the expert on my mom?"

"Mercer Levine. I-" There was a beeping noise, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket. His face immediately clouded. "I have to go."

"Okay. Whatever."

When the door opened a few hours later, I assumed it was just the mailman – sorry, Mercer – again. But when I heard laughing that was distinctly female, I looked up and saw…

"I'm sorry," Thalia snickered. "I mean, you told me you have chickenpox, but you just look so…" She dissolved into a fit of laughter. "I can't believe you've never had chickenpox before."

"Yeah. It sucks. Quit laughing. What are you doing here?"

Thaia looked down at the huge pile of books in her arms that I'd somehow not noticed. "I got your homework for you. Well, your algebra stuff just kind of got dumped on me, so I decided to just keep going after that." She dumped the books on the coffee table and sat down next to me.

"I'm not gonna be able to come back by the end of the semester."

"Well then I'll just keep bringing you your stuff."

I wanted to reach out and grab her hand or something. I wondered if she would pull away. "So you've had chickenpox before," I said.

"When I was two. So...Silena's never had it?"

"Nope."

Our eyes met, though she quickly looked down. "Well, yeah, I'm going to go home now. I'll come back tomorrow."

"You don't have to leave so soon."

"Yeah, I do. Bye, Luke."

* * *

You could tell a lot about someone from checking out their Facebook profile.

Take Luke, for example. He had a couple hundred friends, his only album was one of mobile uploads, and his last status update had been months ago. His profile picture was of us – a snapshot I hadn't known Mom had taken of our New Year's kiss.

At first, it had made me happy that he wasn't one of those guys who hid the fact that he was in a relationship – but then again, his previous profile picture had been one of him and Thalia. I wondered if she'd known she was pregnant when it'd been taken – there was a certain sad look in her eyes.

Which led to some serious Facebook stalking. I went from his profile to hers – they were still Facebook friends; kill me. She hadn't changed her profile picture in months. It was still her and some unfamiliar girl (probably a friend from California), smiling in oversized sunglasses. She had tons of photo albums - of California friends, debate club meetings, random snapshots, prom and homecoming pictures, and everything else imaginable.

But even if she was a chronic picture uploader, there weren't much for statuses. The majority of the posts on her wall were from old friends, asking when she was coming back to visit and what she was up to. She hadn't responded to any of them.

Way back in October, she'd posted a picture of herself and her mom. Their features were nothing alike – her mom was a very Titanic-esque Kate Winslet lookalike, and Thalia was all dark hair and sharp features. You wouldn't believe they were related until you saw the matching looks in their eyes, the same way they carried themselves. Confident, arrogant, above everyone else.

_RIP, Mom._

Okay, so I felt bad for her, but she was the reason my current relationship was falling apart.

When Monday came around, I was all ready for Luke to pick me up so I could announce that I wanted to break up with him. Quick and painless – just like ripping a Band-Aid off. Except, it turned out we didn't have school on Monday. Something about an investigation over the substitute English teacher that had kidnapped one of her students.

And the good news just kept coming. Luke texted me later, announcing that he had chickenpox and wouldn't be back at school for at least a few weeks. I texted Dominik, asking if I'd ever had chickenpox. Mom probably wouldn't have remembered even if I'd had the worst case imaginable. A few minutes later he texted me back, informing me that he and Liam both had it at the same time, but he was pretty sure Violet and I had never gotten it.

Just like my brothers had taught me the three rules of dating, they'd also taught me the three rules of breaking up. Do it quick. Do it in person. Do it as nicely as possible. And seeing as how I really didn't want to get chickenpox, it seemed as though breaking up was just going to have to wait.

Luke hadn't even told me he was sorry for calling me a bitch.

"Come on, Silena!" Mom yelled.

I quickly logged out of Facebook and headed downstairs. By the time I'd grabbed my backpack, Mom was waiting in the car. The entire drive to school, she grumbled about how she couldn't wait till I was old enough to drive so we wouldn't have to find someone to drive me around.

I was the last person at jazz choir. They were already working on one of the songs from Rent that we were singing for festival. Personally, I hated the songs, but I didn't complain because I had a solo in one of them – well, actually a duet with Grover Underwood. And my solo for music festival was coming along really well now that I didn't have anyone to distract me.

Mr. Sol waved a hand, cutting off the choir. "So, now that we're all here…" Cue a deliberate look at me. Well, I'm sorry I was five minutes late for the first time…ever. "I've got an announcement to make. I found accompanists for festival. They were supposed to be here this morning but-"

"Sorry we're late." One of the Stoll brothers burst through the door, followed by Lee Fletcher, who was holding a guitar case. The Stoll brothers had a very appropriate last name, because if you believed everything you heard, their dad was in jail for trying to rob a bank. It was also rumored that they had a thing with the Gardner twins, which was so perfect I wondered why I hadn't thought of it before.

"It's my fault," Lee said. His long blonde hair hung in his eyes, which had dark circles under them. Lee had transferred to our school in the middle of the second semester last year, and Katie Gardner had immediately staked a claim on him. They'd run this school until she broke up with him in August because he didn't spend enough time with her or something. He was one of those people who everyone liked, but he kept to himself a lot.

The Stoll brother grabbed a pair of drumsticks, sat down at the drum set, and immediately started playing the opening to My Sharona. He and his brother ran the percussion section in Shallow Lake's band. We always won marching band awards because of the cadences they came up with.

"What song do you want to run through first?" Mr. Sol asked them. They both shrugged.

Practice went as good as it ever did. Not to sound pessimistic, but when you picked something like Rent, you were never going to sound as good as the original. The drums and guitar helped, though. As soon as we were done, everyone grouped up into their little cliques for the last few minutes before we had to leave. And I, for once, had no one I wanted to talk to.

"You look bored," Lee said. He had this soft voice, but not in a bad way. It just meant that when he talked, people got quiet to listen.

"Yeah."

"Miss your boyfriend that much?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing." He gave me a little smile. "Nothing at all."

* * *

If you were kidnapped by your crazy English teacher who thought you were the son of some long lost boyfriend she'd had, you'd think you'd get the right to be antisocial for a few days after being rescued. But no – the last few days had been a constant stream of reporters and therapists and police officers.

And the weird thing was I felt like I was watching myself handle it all – that is, watching a more collected, smooth-talking version of myself handle it all. I gave the therapists the right answers so they wrote me off with a simple case of PTSD, managed to convince the police that Mrs. M had been a time bomb just waiting to go off, and was able to tell my story to the reporters over and over again without once letting anything slip.

What nobody knew was that I couldn't sleep without having nightmares. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Mrs. M burning right in front of me, begging me to help her. And I felt bad slandering her name. I mean, yeah, she'd been crazy, but she'd had a reason.

But I didn't tell anyone. That was the kind of stuff that got you sent to one of those creepy hotels that treated people who were _mentally unstable_.

The school was in big trouble. They hadn't done of the necessary background checks when they'd hired Mrs. M as a long-term sub. Parents were considering keeping their kids home until the school was sued, but apparently the fact that we weren't pressing charges (like I really wanted to have to deal with a court case) had lessened everyone's worry. And apparently the guidance counselor was teaching English now. Not like I knew – I was probably going to be out of school till the end of the semester.

It was just another ordinary day – Mom told me it was the fifth since I'd been back, but they were all starting to blur together. I came downstairs, lingering at the doorway to the living room, where Mom was sitting on the couch, looking at the newspaper while she talked to someone on the phone.

"Yes, he's on the front page. What do you want me to do about it?" She sounded stressed. "Okay, well maybe if you hadn't…yeah, I know that, D…." Mom trailed off when she saw me. "I have to go. We can talk later."

"Who was that?" I asked.

"Just an old friend. It's noon. Are you hungry?"

"No."

"Some of your friends called this morning. They want to know if they can come see you after school."

"Whatever."

Mom sighed and absently rubbed her stomach. During the month or so I'd been gone, she'd gotten a small baby bump. I tried not to think of having a half-sibling who was the spawn of Satan. "Percy…you're sure…I mean…she didn't say…anything…about anyone?"

"She said a lot of things, Mom. She was crazy. I'm still really tired. I'm going to go back to sleep."

I knew she probably deserved to be treated a little nicer, but Mom was the one person I had a hard time putting an act on for. And I didn't want her knowing how shaken up I really was. She opened her mouth to say something, then shook her head. "Okay."

A few hours later, I heard the door open and my mom great whoever I was there. I realized I'd forgotten to ask which friends were coming over, but I didn't have to wait long until Grover and Annabeth were lingering outside my door.

"You guys can come in," I said. Grover sat across from me on my bed, and Annabeth took the chair by my desk that was covered with all my textbooks and homework assignments I had to catch up on.

"Everyone at school's talking about you," Grover blurted out. "You're famous now. There were, like, reporters in the hallways asking us about what we thought of the whole thing and if we saw it coming and you wouldn't believe how fake people are when there's a-"

"Grover," Annabeth shot him a look. I silently thanked her. "We wanted to see how you're doing. You haven't called or anything."

"I'm fine."

They gave me matching looks.

"Okay, I'm not fine. But it's okay. She can't do anything now. She's…dead." I had a hard time forcing the last word out.

"Yeah, but what about Dean King? Do you think he's still alive? Do you think he knows about you now?" Annabeth asked eagerly.

Grover snorted, which actually sounded more like a bleat. Maybe his goats were rubbing off on him. "With all the publicity he's getting, I think everyone in the Midwest knows who he is."

I thought about mentioning my mom's phone call, but decided against it. "Guys, I really don't care. I just want to put all this Dean King stuff behind me."

Apparently Annabeth didn't get the message. "But isn't it weird how you look just like-"

"No."

"And there's-"

"Nope."

"But she-"

"Not seeing it."

Annabeth glared at me, while Grover nervously looked from me to her. I just shrugged. "You can keep playing detective, but I'm done. If Dean King is still alive somewhere, I hope I never meet him."


	29. The Ugly Face of Truth

**Chapter Twenty-Nine  
****The Ugly Face of Truth**

It started when my math teacher asked me if I'd take Luke his homework. Well, she actually dumped the job on me before I could protest. And I guess since he'd been so uncharacteristically nice lately, I figured I'd do him a favor and get the rest of his books and assignments.

I figured it'd be easy enough – go to his house, drop off homework, talk a little bit, leave, and repeat the next day.

I managed to make it two weeks before I'd messed up. I'd come with worksheets and a list of assignments, expecting to be in and out. But as soon as I said I had to leave, Luke put on this pathetic face and asked if I'd stay and help him with chemistry.

Whatever. It'd seemed innocent enough at the time.

So I was trying to explain the difference between alkenes and alkynes when Luke's short attention span reached its end. He squeezed my wrist; I hated that the little gesture made my heartbeat accelerate. "Hey, can we talk?"

"About?"

Luke shrugged. "I don't know. I miss you…having you…as a friend. To talk to." It was obvious what he wanted to say in the pauses. "I mean, I don't know…"

So I couldn't decide if he looked cute or pathetic, with chickenpox and a conflicted look on his face. I decided to focus on the pathetic aspect of it – it was probably safer that way.

"Yeah, well, neither do I. I have to go."

He got up with me and stood in my way. "Please." Before I could protest, he leaned down and kissed me.

"Now I really have to go." I brushed past him and was out the door before he could say (or do) anything else, trying really hard not to feel about how that one kiss had made me feel.

If I had any common sense, I would have just texted him the assignments the next day. After all, his locker was basically empty now after being out of school for a few days. But I was stupid. That's the only possible explanation.

"Hey." Luke smiled when I walked in, apparently not feeling the same tension that I was. "Can you actually stay for a while today or do you have to go right away again?"

"If that's code for _do you want to stay and make out or just leave now? _Then I definitely have to go right away again."

His smile wavered. "I only kissed you because I thought it might make you stay. I get to go back to school soon," he added.

"You have a girlfriend."

"Only because I was mad at you for…you know."

I wanted to tell him that he didn't know. I wanted to ask him to really look at me and tell me he didn't see anything different. I wanted to go back in time to the moment I'd told him I'd gotten an abortion and change things – better yet, go back to the moment we'd slept together.

"Hey, it's okay." Somehow he'd gotten up and wrapped his arms around me without my noticing. God, I had to pull it together. "It's done now. We can't change it."

I shoved him off. "How can you be so fucking stupid? It's like you think you can just wave a magic wand or something and everything goes back to normal."

His face turned red, and just like that, his emotions completely changed. "I don't get it. I hate you and you want me. And now I'm pretty much begging you to take me back and you don't want anything to do with me. So what do you want? I'm sick of having to guess."

"Yeah, you hated me so much that when I threw myself, you didn't even have to think twice before-"

"I was wasted! And you knew that."

"You could have used a condom."

"You could have told me before you went and got an abortion."

"Well I'm sorry I'm not perfect like you."

He was shaking with anger. For a second, I was scared he was going to hit me. "Get out."

I didn't need to be told twice.

I got in my car and drove around Shallow Lake for a while, not quite ready to go home but not having anywhere else to go. Finally, I ended up pulling in front of the di Angelo's house. There weren't any cars in the driveway, but I thought it was worth a try.

Nico was the one who answered the door. "Hey. Bianca's not here. Go away." Deductive reasoning told me something was wrong. "Seriously, she had some music thing. Go away."

"You look like you need someone to talk to."

"Whatever." He stormed down the hallway into the living room, where he had a giant glass bottle of something alcoholic open.

"Nico, you're in 8th grade. Aren't you a little young to be drinking?"

"You're a junior. Aren't you a little young to be pregnant?" he shot back. "I'm not drinking a lot, and I'll water it down so Dad and Bianca don't know. But it's not like Dad's ever home anyway – and Bianca never is anymore either."

"What's wrong?" I sat down on the couch. He tossed his phone at me.

A message from Grover was opened up. _I don't want to be anything more than friends ever. My parents would kill me if they knew. _

"You know what I can't stand? People who fucking can't be honest with other people. It's like, who cares if people hate you? I'd rather not have any secrets and have everyone hate me for it. Because eventually people find out. And when they do, it's never pretty." Nico sighed. "Whatever. I didn't really like him anyway."

I don't think he was aiming at about me during his little tirade, but it didn't stop me from feeling guilty. "Sometimes it's better for people not to know. Would you rather be lied to or hurt?"

Nico glared at me. "Luke's going to find out. And when he does, he's going to be pissed you didn't tell him. So you might as well get it done with."

"You don't know what you're talking about."

"Yeah, probably not. But then again, you're probably just saying that because you know I'm right."

I left a few minutes later, after making Nico put the alcohol away and promise not to get it back out once I was gone. And then I did what I really didn't want to do. I got back in my car, drove to Luke's house, and rang the doorbell before I could think too much about it.

"What do you want?" Luke narrowed his eyes at me, looking like he was debating slamming the door in my face.

"Can I come in? I think we need to talk," I said.

"About?"

He wasn't going to make this easy. I guess I deserved it. "Remember when I told you I got an abortion? Well…" This was it. "I didn't."

All of the color drained from his face. "Oh my God."

He slammed the door, then opened it again a few seconds later. "I'm sorry. Oh my fucking God. You're pregnant. Do you…do you want to come in?"

I stepped inside. Luke shut the door and looked at me. I saw him look down at my stomach, eyes wide with fear. Out of all the reactions I'd thought he might have, this wasn't one of them. I expected a lot of shouting, for one.

"Do you need anything? Like, are you hungry? Thirsty? How many weeks along are you? Have you seen a doctor yet? Oh my God. I can't believe this is happening. Do you want to sit down?" Luke asked, looking absolutely terrified.

I tried to keep up with him. "No, I'm okay. I'm 16 weeks along. And there's another thing, Luke. We're, well, going to have twins."

Luke looked like he might pass out. We sat down on the couch, and he took both my hands in his. "I can't believe this is happening. Why…why didn't you tell me?"

"It was easier not to. I was scared, Luke. And then you cornered me and it was just simpler to lie…" I couldn't stand the look he was giving me – not angry, but incredibly hurt. "I'm sorry."

Luke was quiet for a long, long time. I wished he would say something, anything. Finally: "What are we going to do?"

I shook my head. "I don't know."

"I have an idea." He had this look in his eyes that I didn't like. "What if we get married?"


	30. Miscommunications

**Chapter Thirty  
****Miscommunications**

Ever had a day go amazingly and then suddenly everything falls apart?

Yesterday, Cyrus (it was weird calling a teacher by their first name, but it was even weirder telling someone you'd made out with Mr. Sol) had taken me to this little café a few towns away right after school got out.

I still hadn't told anyone about our relationship. I mean, the only person I'd think of telling was Thalia, and every time I tried, it seemed like she had enough on her plate. And if the wrong person were to find out, I was pretty sure Cyrus would be out of a job.

He was only six years older than me. It wasn't that weird.

It was actually kind of a good thing, when I thought about it. Most guys my age were concerned with seeing how far they could get with a girl, versus Cyrus, who seemed okay to let me take things as slow as I wanted.

We ended up staying out a lot later than I'd expected. Cyrus had a friend who was performing at an open mic night at a bar, so I'd agreed to go with him. I was banking on my dad not being home – and nine times out of ten, he wasn't.

Of course, it was the lucky tenth day.

Dad was sitting in the living room, calmly reading the newspaper when I finally stumbled through the door a few minutes before midnight. He gave me a calm stare before folding up the paper and saying, "Want to tell me what the hell you were doing?"

I bit back a remark about how he didn't have the right to ask when half the time we didn't know where he was. "I was helping a friend study. We have finals next week. It got a little late, but I didn't have clothes there or anything, so I came home."

"You think I can't tell when you're lying?" Dad asked.

"Well it's not like you're ever home," I shot back before thinking about it.

Dad grabbed his newspaper and went back to reading. "Go to sleep. We'll talk in the morning. But there are going to be consequences, Bianca."

I stormed down the hall and opened the door to Nico's room without knocking. Predictably, he was still awake, watching some horror movie on the huge TV in his room. He glared at me. "Thanks for knocking."

"Yeah, and thanks for telling me Dad's home. I'm in serious shit."

"You know everything's not about you," Nico hissed. "Where the hell were you? You know what? I don't care. But wherever you were, did you ever think about checking your phone? I needed you today. And Thalia came here today looking for you. Whatever." He mumbled something under his breath. I couldn't quite make it out, but it sounded a lot like _selfish bitch_.

Yeah, I was selfish. How could he think that? I was the one who took care of him, and suddenly everything wasn't all about him, and he was mad. It was my dad he should have been angry with.

I got to my room and grabbed my phone off my nightstand; I'd forgotten to grab it this morning. There were about twenty missed calls – a few from Nico, and the rest from Thalia. Before reading my messages, I sent Thalia a quick text.

_Hey, are you still awake?_

Immediately, I wished I hadn't. All of the messages from her were begging her to call me because she really needed to talk. They stopped around 10:30. I prayed she'd decided to go to sleep.

But then again, maybe if she was still awake, I could convince her to go along with my studying lie. She owed me after keeping her pregnancy secret. And then if I could figure out some way to get back on Nico's good side, everything would be back to normal.

Thalia was calling me, and I really didn't have an excuse not to answer now that I'd just texted her. Bracing myself for whatever crap was new in her life, I answered the phone.

"Oh my God. Where have you been? I've been trying to call you since it happened."

It. That sounded bad. "I was out with a friend, and I told my dad I was at your house studying. What happened?"

"So I was stupid and I told Luke and he kind of freaked out." I was probably supposed to say something, but I was too tired. "And he said we should get married."

"What did you say?" I wished I'd waited till tomorrow to call her, because right now, I was too tired to properly listen and react.

Thalia sighed. "I don't know. I told him we could talk about it once everything sunk in for him. But I'm not marrying him in high school. I don't think he's the kind of guy I'd want to marry ever."

"Then maybe you should have thought about that before you went and got knocked up," I snapped. My voice sounded a lot bitchier than I wanted it to. I swear, I was just tired. "Think about it – you're stuck with him for the rest of your life."

"You think I don't know that? God, if I wanted the parent act I would have just talked to my…"

"Well then what do you want me to say?"

"I need a friend right now, Bianca."

"So do I, but it's always somehow about you."

"You're a real bitch." She hung up.

I hoped that things would be better tomorrow. Well, this morning, seeing as it was now about one in the morning. There was jazz choir, so I figured I'd show up a bit early and talk to Cyrus. He'd understand.

Dad was gone when I woke up. I should have figured – last night was one fluke in 18 years of passive parenting. I ate breakfast quickly and drove to school.

Cyrus was sitting in his office when I got there, seeing as how jazz choir didn't start for another half hour. He was on the phone, and it sounded like he was almost done, so I decided to wait outside the door for him.

"I'm sorry, Daph…I was out with a friend and my phone was dead, like I told you…okay, so what am I supposed to do? You guys live three hours away…yeah, fine. Bye."

I probably wasn't supposed to overhear that, but it was too late to turn around. "Oh, hey, Bianca," Cyrus said, trying to sound cool.

"What was that about?" I asked, keeping the accusatory tone out of my voice. Or at least I thought so.

"My…my friend was sick last night," he snapped. "It was nothing. Daphne worries a lot about nothing." Before I could ask my next question, he answered it. "And Daphne is just an old friend. Now is there any other aspect of my life you want to examine before everyone else arrives?"

"I just wanted to talk to you! Sorry if that's an inconvenience."

"You know what? There's a lot on my plate right now and it doesn't help that you're-"

The door to the band room opened. "Sorry I'm late. I didn't get up on time, and…oh. I got the times mixed up," Grover said, realizing just how much of an awkward situation he'd walked into.

"I came to work on my solo," I said by way of explanation. "But Mr. Sol is so busy that he doesn't have time to help me."

Cyrus shot me a look. "I'll be in my office. Feel free to hang out, guys."

Grover looked as though I was the last person he wanted to be left alone with. Well what the hell had I done to make him mad? He chewed on his lip for a few seconds before blurting out, "I'm really sorry. I just couldn't do it. What if my parents found out? I really don't want to be kicked out of the house. I'm not even 16 yet. And-"

"Wait, what?"

Grover took a few deep breaths. "Nico didn't tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

"I, umm," Grover dropped his voice, looking at the direction of Cyrus' office. "I told him I'm never…gonna want to be more than friends."

"Oh." So that's why he'd needed me yesterday.

Grover looked eager to change the subject. "Did Thalia call you last night? She called me, but she told me she really wanted to talk to you. Can you believe it? I wonder what Silena's gonna be like today. Do you think they'll really get married? I told her my sister got pregnant and-"

"Grover. Stop."

It was going to be a long day.

* * *

You knew your day was going to suck when it started with Annabeth Chase calling you at six in the morning.

So Annabeth wasn't really that bad. At least, she didn't scare me like she used to when I only knew her as an uptight perfectionist. She was just a little….exhausting.

"I didn't wake you up, Grover. Did I?" she asked after I groggily answered the phone.

"Doesn't matter. What's up?"

"Well I forgot to tell you yesterday. It's Percy's first day back at school. We should go with him – you know, moral support and all." It'd been two weeks since we'd rescued him. "He seems okay, but really. How can you be fine after that?"

"Oh man. I would. It's just that I've got jazz choir this morning, and I've got a solo so I can't skip." And we had an earlier practice this morning that I'd completely forgot about. "And I'm already late, so I gotta go. Sorry!"

And I hung up quickly rather than facing the wrath of Annabeth.

My parents were already awake by the time I'd gotten dressed and run downstairs. I quickly made up some excuse about being really behind on a tech ed project that was due tomorrow.

Mom had been obviously irritated and had muttered something about not being able to wait till I could drive, but she did take me in. Practice was supposed to be at 6:30 – it had taken me ten minutes to get ready, and we were 25 minutes out of town.

I all but ran into the school and pushed through the door to the music room, blurting out an excuse about my lateness before realizing that Bianca and Mr. Sol were the only ones there.

And if that wasn't suspicious enough, Bianca immediately blurted out an excuse for why she was there. It sure seemed like she came early a lot.

Mr. Sol retreated to his office, leaving me and Bianca. And right now she was the last person I wanted to be alone with. She just gave me this level gaze, which I personally found a lot more unnerving than any amount of shouting.

Finally I cracked. "I'm really sorry. I just couldn't do it. What if my parents found out? I really don't want to be kicked out of the house. I'm not even 16 yet. And-"

"Wait, what?" she interrupted, looking completely confused.

And so was I. "Nico didn't tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

"I, umm." There wasn't any way to put it nicely. "I told him I'm never…gonna want to be more than friends."

"Oh." Bianca had this weird look on her face, kind of like she was lost in thought.

The silence was too awkward. "Did Thalia call you last night? She called me, but she told me she really wanted to talk to you. Can you believe it? I wonder what Silena's gonna be like today. Do you think they'll really get married? I told her my sister got pregnant and-"

"Grover. Stop." Bianca shot me one of those looks that had made me scared of her before I got to know her. It didn't take a genius to figure out that she didn't want to talk.

Other people started showing up about ten minutes later. When Silena arrived, it was obvious that Luke had broken up with her. And another thing that was obvious – she wasn't taking it well. Her eyes were red and puffy, and she was wearing baggy sweats and a hoodie. "I mean, I was going to break up with him, but he was just so…" she said loudly to one of the other girls, trailing off in a fit of tears. "It's Thalia; I know it."

The girl agreed a little too quickly before running off to talk with someone else. Silena upset seemed like a lot to handle – I didn't blame her. Well, until Silena sat down on the choir risers next to me. She was still sniffling.

"Did you hear, Grover?" she asked me. I shook my head, deciding it was best to pretend I didn't know anything. Silena fished her rhinestone-encrusted phone out of her pocket and scrolled down through her messages. "There. Start here."

Let me summarize so you don't have to go through the same torture I did: Luke tried to be as vague as possible breaking up with her, she got nasty with him, he got nastier with her, and it ended with him telling her to shut up because he had better things to do than argue with an "ugly stupid slut."

"I mean, I knew I was the rebound, but I never thought he'd go back to her! Not after what she did to him. You don't know him like I do. What she did really hurt him. I mean, he never talked about it, but a girl can tell these things. Why would he like her more than me?" Silena asked me, her eyes filling with tears again.

I wished Thalia hadn't told me last night, but even if she hadn't, I'd know this was about her. "Umm…I don't know," I mumbled. "Luke's not the greatest guy. No offense or anything. You're just…probably better off without him."

"But everyone's going to think it's so funny when he finally comes back to school and he's with her," Silena continued. "They'll think I'm just a stupid slut. But I guess it doesn't matter, because that's what they think anyway."

"It won't be that bad."

"Yes, it will. I mean, my reputation couldn't get any worse if I dated you. No offense," she quickly added. "Wait…maybe…if I…then people wouldn't think…"

"I, uh, have to go. Tech ed project," I said, quickly removing myself from an emotionally unstable Silena Beauregard.

Everyone else would understand. At least, I hoped they would.

* * *

Saying Percy Jackson was a nervous wreck was like saying I was kind of a perfectionist.

When I met him at the steps outside of school, he seemed okay. But that flimsy façade quickly disappeared on the walk to our lockers. He didn't say anything, but the slightest sound made him look over his shoulder.

"Percy. You're okay," I finally said after a guy on the swim team had tapped him on the shoulder and he'd jumped.

"I know that! But…" Whatever he said next was lost as a loud group of sophomores walked by us. "I don't know. I know it's dumb."

After the first day Grover and I had gone to see him, Percy had just shut down whenever we'd tried to talk about Mrs. M. I didn't get it. If it was me, I would want to track this Dean King guy down and tell him exactly what I thought of him.

It was like Percy didn't even care.

The story had been all over the news – of course, the version they told was far from the truth. They portrayed Mrs. M as a certifiably crazy woman (which I guess was true), and our school as a terrible place for hiring her (which again, was also true). Well, maybe their version wasn't far from the truth – it just had giant holes.

Most people were surprised Percy was back so soon. But two weeks added to an entire month away from school had added up. He said the school had called his mom and said a bunch of stuff about how they understood the situation, but if he didn't want to repeat his freshman year, he'd have to come back as soon as possible.

I think Percy's mom should have threatened to sue the school for all the trouble they'd caused. But you know, that was just me. Come to think of it, the entire family seemed really eager to put the whole incident behind them.

"Who's teaching English now?" Percy asked after looking over his shoulder again.

"The guidance counselor." I was pretty sure Grover and I had told him that during one of our visits to his house. "And we're doing poetry. I don't know how the school thinks he's qualified, but there's a lot of controversy about…you know…the hiring for substitute teachers."

I shouldn't have worried about treading lightly over the subject. Percy wasn't even listening. "Oh. Cool," he said when he realized I'd stopped talking.

"You know you could go home if you're not ready for this."

"I'm fine!" Percy said a little too loudly. A few groups of people stopped talking and looked over at us. "Seriously. I'm as ready as I'm ever going to be."

I wished Grover was here. What was I supposed to say?

That was when we saw Grover bolting down the hallway. "Gotta hide from Silena," was his brief explanation. "I think…she wants to go out with me."

As Grover continued running down the hall, Percy look at me and asked, "When did that happen?"

If only I knew.


	31. The Drama Scene

It's recap time!

Luke's mom suddenly decided to play the concerned parent role. He thinks she's crazy. He also got chickenpox, got Thalia back, and found out about the pregnancy. Poor guy.  
Bianca is now dating Mr. Sol. Cyrus. She can't decide which name is weirder to call him. But she's got bigger problems. Like the fact that EVERYONE thinks she's a bitch.  
Percy got rescued. Mrs. M blew herself up. And she mentioned something about Annabeth's mom. Wonder which one she meant?  
Clarisse's dad is like, a badass army guy. And he's coming home from Iraq soon. And she maybe has a thing with Chris. Things are going great for this girl!  
Silena was going to break up with Luke, but he beat her to it, and she's having a hard time dealing with it. So she might want to date Grover now, who doesn't seem to be looking for any kind of relationship.  
It seems like Sally knows something about Dean King. But Percy doesn't care, even though it's like, Annabeth's mission to figure the story out. I see conflict coming.

And that's [a very condensed version of] what you missed! ;)

**Chapter Thirty-One  
****The Drama Scene**

Ever since I found out I was going to miss three weeks of school, I hadn't been looking forward to coming back.

But the prospect of school no longer scared me half as much as the two girls I was going to have to face there – one being my four-months-pregnant girlfriend (I think it was accurate to call her that), and the other being the girl I'd dumped when I found out about the aforementioned pregnancy.

So I figured if I could the initial confrontation with one of them over with before school started, the day would go at least marginally better.

Wrong.

I'd thought picking up Thalia before school would be a nice gesture. Apparently she didn't see it the same way.

"You know just because I'm pregnant doesn't mean I'm not capable of driving myself to school," Thalia said flatly when she answered the door. "You don't have to start giving me special treatment."

"Yeah, well, I wanted to talk to you." I tried to look at her as subtly as possible and couldn't believe I hadn't noticed before. She'd started wearing baggier clothes, but pretty soon it was going to be obvious that she wasn't just putting on a few pounds.

"Quit looking at me like that," Thalia snapped. "If people see you acting like that, they're going to be able to put two and two together a lot faster." She pushed past me and headed for my car. "Come on, I don't want to be late."

Once I'd pulled out of her driveway, she started talking. "So, I've already found a few couples I like. You can come with and meet them if you want, but it really doesn't-"

"Wait, what?"

Thalia gave me a look that screamed are you that stupid? "Adoptive parents," she said slowly, enunciating the words sarcastically. "My God, you really think I'd want to raise one child with you? We're having twins, Luke. Twins. It's better for us…and them if we give them up."

I tried not to let the words sink in. That was the only way I could deal with all this without completely losing it. "What if I said no?"

"Well it doesn't matter. Because you're going to agree with me."

"I don't think so." She opened up her mouth to argue again. "If you didn't want them, you would have gotten an abortion. Otherwise, what's the point of going through the nine months and having nothing to show for it at the end?"

"Knowing we didn't kill two people and instead are giving two people a better chance at life?"

Thinking of them as two very real people made me feel sick. Kind of like how I'd always feel sick the last few hours before a track meet. Only I doubted puking and then drinking a few energy drinks would help this situation much.

"I don't want to meet potential parents yet."

"I told you that you don't have to come," Thalia said through gritted teeth.

"No…I do want to come…eventually, but…the whole thing hasn't really sunk in yet, okay?" I hoped she'd get that I didn't want to talk about it anymore today. Not when it was obvious we weren't going to get anywhere.

"Well, let me help speed up the process. We had sex on Halloween. I got pregnant. I'm due at the end of July, though since they're twins, they'll probably come earlier. Right now I'm at 16 weeks, so if we wanted to, we could find out their sexes. They're about five inches long, they're starting to grow toenails, and-"

"Stop." My knuckles were white on the steering wheel. Suddenly puking didn't seem like such a bad idea.

I saw Thalia look at me out of the corner of my eye. Her face softened. "You okay? You still look kind of sick, Luke. Maybe you should wait a few more days before you come back to school."

"No. I'm fine."

Thalia waited for a few seconds before speaking. "I'm sorry. I'm scared, too." I didn't say anything. "Umm, I wasn't going to tell you, but I suppose I guess now you have a right to know…" She took a deep breath. "I have an appointment tomorrow at one."

"Oh. Cool."

Thalia sighed. "You can come if you want to. Like, in the room with me. I've got an ultrasound scheduled."

I thought about it for a second. "Are you going to find out the sexes?"

"I wasn't…I mean…it makes it feel too real." Thalia bit her lip. "What do you think?"

It was a step forward that she was at least asking for my opinion, only, I wasn't sure I was ready to give it. So I decided a change of subject was best. "I'll say I don't feel good and leave at 11, then wait for you in my car. Your appointment's in Degis, right?"

"Yeah. Thanks." Thalia looked at me. "No holding hands in the hallway today or anything, got it?" The tough girl exterior was back. "Because one: we do not need to be attracting attention. And two: we're not even really together."

"Okay, well do you want me to drop you off here?" We were a few blocks away from the school. "You know, it might look kind of suspicious if people see that I drove you to school." I didn't try to keep the sarcastic tone out of my voice.

She didn't say anything, just got out of the car once we got to school and marched up the steps without saying two words to me.

I knew coming back to school after a three-week absence wouldn't be the easiest thing in the world. I mean, school was hard enough when I was there every day. Still, I didn't expect it to go half as badly as it did.

It started when I got called out of my first hour algebra class to the guidance office.

Mr. What's-his-face had added a few more posters to the walls about self-esteem and friendship. I wondered what kind of person would come to a perpetually hung-over loser to talk about how they were sad because their best friend told them they were ugly.

"It's not good news, Luke," he said flatly, then continued on about how my grades and attendance sucked. I kind of drowned it all out – it wasn't like I hadn't heard it before. "…your junior year," he finished. Due to the fact that he seemed to speak in one tone of voice, I really hadn't seen the ending coming, and therefore, had missed it.

"What?"

If I didn't know him better, I'd say he almost looked sympathetic for a billionth of a second.

"You're going to have to retake your junior year."


	32. A Note From Eliss

**Chapter Thirty-Two**

**A Note from Eliss**

Okay, lovelies. I hate to dedicate a whole chapter as an Author's Note, but it's kind of necessary. I'm just letting everyone know that the previous 31 chapters have all been redone. Most have just undergone minor typo fixing, but a few things have changed. The only big one that comes to mind is I changed Grover and Nico to being friends, and Silena and Grover are not together.

So now you're probably wondering why I did this. Well, I tried to do a remake of this story, but I just couldn't get into it like I could get into this story. I've decided to give this another go, and with any luck, it will be done before fall.

I've got a lot of ideas planned, and I'm excited to get writing! Look for a new chapter within the next few days, lovelies.

xx

Eliss


	33. The Party Scene

**Chapter Thirty-Three  
****The Party Scene**

Driving to Degis with Luke was the very definition of terrifying.

I guess things started off well enough. He was waiting for me in his car, but didn't say anything once I got in. Wordlessly, he pulled out of the school's parking lot and began the long drive.

Finally, I couldn't take it anymore. "Doctor Zatari is going to do an ultrasound. Should we find out the sexes?"

"It's up to you."

That was all he said. I wished the radio worked in the car – anything to get rid of the suffocating silence. "We're going to have to tell people eventually," I tried. "I mean, eventually it's going to get obvious that I'm pregnant."

Luke didn't even look at me. "You can tell people what you want when you want to."

"Aren't we in this together?" I demanded.

"I don't know. Are we?"

I didn't know how to deal with this side of him. I'd seen Luke angry, snarky, even terrified – never so apathetic. "You told me that I'm going to agree with whatever you do, so I'm done caring. Pick what you want and I'll support you, but that's all I'm going to do."

"What happened to getting married?" I asked.

"Like you said, it would never work."

And on that note, we didn't say anything until Luke got to Degis and asked for directions to the OB/GYN's office. Finally, I couldn't take it anymore. "Something else is bugging you. You can tell me, Luke."

With all the emotion you'd use to talk about the weather, Luke answered me. "I've missed too much school and my grades are terrible. I have to redo my junior year."

"What? You can't control that you were sick with chickenpox."

"I can control the fact that I'm failing six of my seven classes." It didn't seem like he even cared.

"Even if you do well on your finals?"

"Acing my finals would only bring my grade up enough in four of my classes." He didn't have to tell me how improbable it was that he'd score that well on any of them.

Luke pulled into the parking lot of the clinic and miraculously found a spot close to the doors. "Are you ready for this?" he asked me, his voice still carrying next to no emotion. Without waiting for an answer, he stepped out of the car.

"What is wrong with you?" I demanded. "You're going to be the father of twins and you have to retake your junior year. You're going nowhere in life, and you don't seem to care at all!"

Luke shrugged and stepped out of the car. "Getting mad doesn't do anything."

"Neither does giving up," I said, glaring. He only shrugged me off. "You're a real ass, you know that?"

"Yeah. Let's just get this done with."

Since each of us had a mom who worked at the clinic, I was surprised that the woman at the front desk didn't know either of us, even when I gave her our last names. However, when she looked at our ages, she didn't refrain from giving us a condescending look. "You can take a seat. Doctor Zatari will be here shortly."

"Is the doctor going to be like that?" Luke whispered to me once we took our seats. I could tell how uncomfortable he felt with everything.

"She's nice. The nurse might be a total bitch, though."

Luke put his head in his hands and groaned.

"It's only going to get worse, you know. Once everyone at school knows – just think what it'll be like when your mom finds out." I gave the words time to sink in. "Look, I have a plan so we can avoid all that. My grandpa lives in Florida – he'll let me stay with him for the rest of the year. I'll have the twins and give them up."

Luke stared at me blankly, no expression in his face whatsoever. "When would you leave?" he finally asked.

"Two weeks – right after the Valentine's Day dance."

"That sounds like a great idea," Luke said.

The appointment went as well as it could go. Doctor Zatari was cold and unfriendly to Luke, but he was passive and apathetic towards her. We decided not to find out the sexes of the babies. I realized that if I went to Florida to have them, Luke might never find out.

I wonder if he realized that.

* * *

Annabeth had agreed to spend her study hall helping me get caught up in algebra. I couldn't tell her how much I appreciated the effort, especially since finals were only a week away and I'd missed most of class due to being kidnapped.

Wow, my life sounded messed up.

"Okay, so now you have a quadratic expression so you're going to have to factor it," Annabeth said, pointing to the sample problem in the book. "And then because of the zero product property, you know that one of them will have-"

"Annabeth, can I ask you something?"

"Of course. Am I going too fast?"

"No, you're doing really good. I actually kind of…understand this stuff. I was just wondering if…" She was staring at me with those piercing gray eyes of hers. It made me completely lose my nerve. "…if you could help me with the next couple sections, too."

Annabeth shrugged, like she'd been expecting to anyway. "Yeah, I can do that."

I wish I could have just asked her. There was a dance – apparently Shallow Lake always had one the week of Valentine's Day. Grover told me just about everyone who went brought a date – he'd also told me I should take Annabeth.

I guess the idea had kind of stuck. I just couldn't find the right way to ask her.

"Okay, this section is about graphing quadratics. Remember, a negative value on your quadratic term will flip the parabola upside down, but the signs of the linear and constant terms don't matter."

I wondered how she could remember all this math that she'd taken last year. I could hardly remember what we'd done in the first quarter. "Did you hear about the party tonight in Rein?" I asked her.

"Percy! Are you even listening to me?" she demanded.

"Yeah, negative value on the quadratic thing flips the paragraph-"

"Parabola."

"-upside down. I can think about multiple things at once." And I usually was. It was a side effect of having ADHD. "So did you hear about the party?"

"Yeah, but it's for upperclassmen. And anyway, it's going to be a big booze fest. You know what happened at the last party like that."

"How do you know all that?"

Annabeth shrugged. "There are a couple junior guys in my tech ed class. Anyway, to find the vertex of your parabola, you take the opposite of b and divide it by two times a. Then you just have to plot points and draw with a smooth curve."

"Has anyone ever told you that you're way too smart?"

Annabeth gave me a perky smile. "Yeah, but it doesn't hurt to get reminded now and again."

"Are you stressed about finals?"

"Not really. In most of my classes, I could bomb them and still get an A in the class," Annabeth said. I don't think she realized how much she was bragging. "Finals next week, and then the Valentine's Day dance," she said, almost like she was thinking out loud.

I couldn't believe she'd brought it up. "Yeah…are you going to that?"

"Well, Grover and I thought it would be good for you to get out, so we agreed to take you. You're not allowed to say no – it's not healthy for you to just hole yourself away in your house."

I hoped my mouth wasn't hanging open. Why would Grover agree to something like that after he told me to ask Annabeth myself? There was no way I could ask Annabeth if just the two of us could go now.

"Yeah, uh, that sounds like a good idea…I guess."

"Awesome! Okay, now here's the section about the discriminant. This is kind of hard, but if you remember the quadratic formula, it's not that bad…"

I would have killed for half of Annabeth's brainpower.

* * *

As much as I pretended that I didn't care about everything that was going on, it really felt like it was eating me alive. When Thalia told me she was considering leaving to Florida, didn't know what to do but encourage her.

Like moving the problem a few states away was the same as getting rid of it.

When I got a text that night about a party a few towns away, I was ready to do anything to get my mind off everything that was happening. I gave Mom some vague excuse about a science project and was out of the house as fast as possible.

It was exactly the kind of party I'd been hoping for – the music was loud, the girls were slutty, and the alcohol didn't seem to have any end. After half an hour, I was completely wasted, making out with some girl on the couch.

I didn't know her name, and I sure as hell didn't want to find out. Things were fine until a blonde girl showed up. "What are you doing?" she shrieked, shoving the girl off. "He's mine."

Before I knew what was happening, the other girl was gone and the blonde had taken her place. "Luke?" she asked. "Are you drunk?"

I tried to focus on her face, to figure out who she was since she obviously knew me. "I'm not drunk," I protested, though the slurred speech kind of contradicted my statement. I pulled her closer, kissing her hungrily.

"You know you usually quit doing this after you break up," the girl said, though the places she was putting her hands showed she didn't have a problem with it. God, why couldn't I remember who she was?

"Why stop now?" I asked her. She laughed and pulled me off the couch, to a more private room where she made sure to shut the door.

By that point, I was so drunk that I don't think I could have stopped what happened next if I tried. I remember getting undressed, and her telling me she always knew I'd come back to her.

And from there, it's all kind of a pleasure-filled blur. That is, until I woke up with a pounding headache and a feeling of déjà vu. My head was resting on her naked chest…

Silena's chest.

She laughed, running her fingernails over my shoulder blades. "I thought you would never wake up. Don't worry; it's only been a few hours."

"What the hell?" I demanded, getting out of bed and throwing my clothes on in record time. "I didn't even know who the fuck you were a few hour ago. What were you thinking, Silena? We broke up for a reason."

Silena grinned at me and stepped out of bed. God, she looked amazing, and she wasn't doing anything to hide the fact that she was naked. "We did? Because you were here single, and so was I, so I just thought it seemed perfect…" she said, pressing herself against me.

"If it makes you feel better, I made sure to make you use protection," she said, running a hand through my hair. She stood on her tiptoes, pressing her mouth right to my ear. "And I'd do it with you again if you wanted to," she whispered.

"God, no…shit…" I said, pushing her off and pacing to the other side of the bedroom. My head was pounding, which made it really hard to listen to when my body was sending me a completely different message. "I just slept with you."

Silena bent down and grabbed her jeans off the floor. Instead of putting them back on, she reached into the pocket and pulled out a condom. "Wanna do it again?" she asked, giving me a seductive smile.

I guess I was screwed either way. "Why the hell not?"

I had wanted a distraction, after all.

_Notes: High School Never Ends is back! I'm feeling inspired like never before, but reviews are always love and a great motivator. Next chapter is the Valentine's Day dance. Be prepared for some coupling up! _


	34. Valentine's Day

**Chapter Thirty-Four  
****Valentine's Day**

So to be honest, I'd never expected to be spending my junior year in Shallow Lake.

But even if I had, I'd never have expected to be going to the Valentine's Day dance with Chris Rodriguez.

It had started in chemistry on the day of our semester final. I'd finished about half an hour early, and I hadn't brought anything else to do, so I was left to draw cubes in my planner. Well, until something hit me in the back of my head.

I leaned over and grabbed the crumpled piece of paper. Immediately, I recognized Luke's blocky handwriting. _You're starting to show. Just saying._

Like I didn't realize that. It had taken me twenty minutes that morning to find an outfit that I felt remotely comfortable in. I turned around and glared at him, ripping his note into tiny pieces. He shrugged and held up his hands in surrender. _Just trying to be helpful, _he mouthed.

He knew I was leaving in a week and he hadn't once tried to talk to me about it. It wasn't like I wanted him to try and talk me out of my decision, but still – it would have been nice to feel like he cared just a bit.

That was when Chris Rodriguez took the empty seat next to me. "Boyfriend drama?" he whispered. I don't want to give you the impression that I didn't like Chris, because I'm sure he was a really nice guy. It's just he'd never talked to me before. Ever.

"Luke isn't my boyfriend."

"That's probably a good thing," Chris said. "He's not exactly, you know…"

"Dependable?"

Chris shook his head in agreement. "Okay, look. This probably seems weird, but…I guess I figure it's our junior year – and I don't have a date to the Valetine's Day dance. I'm assuming you don't have anyone to go with. So I thought we could, you know, go together."

Leaning closer to Luke so he'd get the idea, I agreed. "I'd love to," I told him.

So there I was – a junior in high school, 20 weeks pregnant and trying to hide it in a dark purple dress with just the right amount of poof. I was going to Florida tomorrow, and chances were I'd never come back to Shallow Lake.

I was trying not to think about it all at once.

For now, I was focused on the junior boy who'd bought me a corsage. The one who didn't know I was pregnant and had asked me to this dance for reasons beyond my imagination. "You look really nice," he told me.

"You clean up pretty nice yourself," I said. He really did look nice – all those sports had built up nice muscles. And most guys couldn't pull off dark purple, but he didn't look half bad.

Nell was out of town, so we didn't have to worry about an awkward photo op. It was time to drive off to the dance.

The first and last dance I'd attend in Shallow Lake.

* * *

So to be honest, I'd never expected to lose my virginity to Luke.

But even if I had, I'd never have expected for him to want to do it again, and again, and again. Not that I was complaining – if I made him use protection every time, there wasn't any harm in it.

Until we were lying in my bed one day…sans clothing. The Valentine's Day dance was a few days away, and he still hadn't asked me. It was time to take matters into my own hands.

"So, we're going to the Valentine's Day dance together, right?" I asked, running my hands over his bare chest.

"I thought we had an agreement not to talk in bed," Luke said, kissing me.

"Okay, well I can get out and put my clothes back on." I didn't try to keep the irritation out of my voice. We'd done this more times than I could count in the last two weeks, and Luke still wasn't willing to get serious.

Luke groaned and pulled me back into bed, giving me a pleading look that he knew made my resolve weaken. "Silena – we're just friends…well, more like acquaintances with benefits. You know that, right?"

"Yeah, of course," I lied. We were a lot more than friends with benefits – he just didn't see it yet. "But can't one of those benefits be you taking me to the dance?"

Luke kissed me, taking his time and putting his hands in all the right places. "You know how much more hot you are when you aren't talking?" he asked. "We're not going to the dance together, Silena."

"Well then we're not sleeping together," I said, getting out of bed and throwing on a robe.

He shrugged and got out of bed, putting his clothes back on. "Fine by me."

"So none of this matters to you?" I demanded.

"I don't love you, Silena. This is just sex."

So I backed off for the next few days. Clarisse seemed equally pissed about the Valentine's Day dance – apparently, Chris had asked some other girl out. She claimed she didn't want to go anyway. I saw right through that.

It was weird getting ready for the dance. I'd picked out a skintight electric blue dress a few months ago, knowing that it would look great with Luke's skin tone. That was before we broke up – back when I'd planned on losing my virginity to him after the Valentine's Day dance.

Now I – the hottest sophomore girl – was going to the dance by myself. I was convinced once Luke saw me there, he'd forget all about what he said about being _acquaintances with benefits_. He'd beg for me back.

That was assuming he'd be there.

* * *

So to be honest, I'd never expected to go to the Valentine's Day dance.

But Grover had suggested we bring Percy, and it had seemed like a good idea – it wasn't healthy for him to just hole himself in his house. Since he'd been rescued, I don't think he'd left his house besides to go to school.

Since none of us had our licenses yet, Grover's older brother had agreed to drive us to the dance. I don't think he realized that my mom was going to want to take pictures – and not just one or two. We'd taken at least fifty.

Once Grover and I had been photographed from every possible angle with every backdrop imaginable, my mom finally let us go. We just had to pick up Percy, and then it was time for the dance.

Percy's mom answered the door as soon as we rang the doorbell. Call me crazy, but I think she was just as eager for her son to get out into the real world as we were. "Oh, you two look so nice," she said. She already had her camera in her hand.

When Grover asked me what my dress looked like, I hadn't thought anything of it. It was dark green and knee-length – I only had it because I'd worn it to a cousin's wedding last summer.

When I saw Percy wearing a dark green shirt, I had a feeling Grover had been planning something. That suspicion only increased when Percy revealed a small plastic box containing a corsage. "Grover picked it out," he mumbled to me, seeming clearly self-conscious.

"It looks nice," I said. I guess I felt equally awkward.

Percy's mom took another million photographs, but I noticed Grover stayed out of these. I started wondering if he'd planned this.

From the look on Percy's face when he glared at Grover, I think he was wondering the same thing too.

* * *

All things considered, the ride to the school wasn't half as awkward as it could have been.

"So is it true you're moving again?" Chris asked.

"Tomorrow." I prepared to give him the excuse I'd given everyone about there being too many memories of my mom here, but Chris didn't give me time to start.

"It's because of Luke, isn't it?" he said.

I sighed and just barely resisted the urge to rub my stomach. "I guess you could say that. There's just too much going on here."

"Call me crazy, but you don't seem like the kind of girl who runs away from her problems."

"I'm not really sure what kind of girl I am."

Chris didn't say anything else until we got to the school. We'd opted to show up late – after all, no one showed up right at eight.

"I'm sorry," he said, holding the door open and helping me out of the car. I don't think he knew how much I appreciated it – pregnancy and four inch heels didn't go well together. "I didn't mean to get all serious on you."

"It's fine," I said.

"Can I tell you something?"

"Yeah, sure."

"Back in middle school, I had the biggest crush on you. But, you know, you and Luke were so close that I just figured you were his."

I think Luke had always thought that, too. He just didn't realize it until he kissed me the day we graduated eighth grade. Then I'd gone home and Mom told me we were moving – our plane left that night.

"And now you're leaving again," Chris continued.

"There's a lot more to it than you think," I said. Like, two more people.

"I guess I don't care why you're leaving – I just want you to have a good time tonight, okay?" Chris asked, holding the door open for me.

All things considered, Chris wasn't a bad guy. He might have been a bit too sporty for my taste, but he listened to me when I talked, and he acted like the perfect gentleman. I should have been happy he'd asked me to the dance.

But when we walked into the gym, I felt my stomach flip at the sight of Luke dancing with a girl in a tight blue dress – even in the dark lighting, I'd be willing to bet she was Silena. Broken up – my ass. They were closer than ever.

Wait, my stomach was still doing the flipping thing. Doctor Zatari said I'd probably start feeling the babies kicking around 25 weeks, but it could start sooner.

Well, it was happening. "Oh God," I whispered as the weirdest feeling washed over me. For the first time, it really hit me – in 20 weeks, there would be two little babies out in the world.

My two little babies.

Chris slid an arm around my waist. "Are you okay?" he whispered, following my gaze to Luke and Silena. "We can go if you want to."

"No, I'm fine. Let's dance," I said, pulling him to center court. Balloons were scattered all over the floor, and cheesy decorations could be found all over the walls. The whole thing would have made me laugh – I couldn't believe I was at the Valentine's Day Dance.

Chris pulled me close as a slow song started. "I know you're probably not interested in any guy from Shallow Lake, but I was just thinking – wouldn't it be nice to make Luke jealous before you leave?"

I guess it made me mad watching him dance with Silena like nothing was wrong. "Yeah," I agreed, shooting Luke a glare. To my surprise, even though he was slow dancing with Silena, his gaze was right on me.

He probably did it just because I was watching, I told myself. Still, it didn't stop me from feeling incredibly pissed when Luke leaned over and kissed Silena.

Two could play at that game. In heels, Chris and I were the same height, so I just leaned forward, kissing him lightly. "I'm sorry," I told him. He didn't deserve to be caught in the middle of my fight with Luke. "You deserve to be here with a girl who really cares about you."

"I think I kind of messed it up with her," Chris told me.

"Really?"

"Yeah. I told her I don't date during basketball season, which is true. But I think I led her on up to that point," Chris said. "I don't want to offend you, but she was the first girl I asked, and she told me to get lost."

"She'll come around. You're a nice guy, Chris."

He kissed me again. I was nearly positive that meant Luke was watching.

A few seconds later, my suspicion was confirmed. Chris and I were ripped apart by a very angry Luke. "What the hell, Thalia?" he demanded.

"Lay off, Luke," Chris said, putting himself between Luke and I. If only he really knew what he was getting himself into the middle of.

"I'm leaving tomorrow. Can't you just leave me alone for one night?" I tried.

Luke wasn't backing down. "You're making out with him when you're-"

"Leave her alone," Chris said, putting a protective arm around my waist. "You wanna go?" he asked me.

I nodded. It wasn't until we got outside that I realized I was crying. "God, I'm such a loser," I said, brushing tears off my face.

"No, you're not," Chris said, holding the car door open for me. "Luke's just an ass."

"Yeah, well that just makes me more of a loser for loving him," I said.

Chris shook his head, starting the car. "Wanna just go somewhere and talk?" he asked.

"Sure."

We were on the outskirts of Shallow Lake when Chris tried talking to me again. "Hey, what was Luke going to say when he-"

I saw a flash of light on my right side, and a split second later, I heard the smashing of metal and glass.

Everything went black.

* * *

The only reason I'd come to the stupid dance was because Cyrus had to chaperone. Over the last few weeks, he'd been so busy getting kids ready for music festival that we hadn't had much time to spend together.

He'd also promised me that we could go out as soon as the dance was done.

Just like in years past, the gym had been transformed into a dance floor. Pink streamers and confetti hearts covered the area, and balloons were scattered around the floor just for good measure. I'd waited until about ten to show up, expecting a complete snore fest.

Cyrus was collecting money outside the gym. "You look amazing, Bianca," he told me as I handed him my admission fee. "I'm supposed to do this for another half hour, and then I'm free to go," he added quietly.

I couldn't wait.

Technically, Valentine's Day was still two days away, but this was all we were going to get with Cyrus' busy schedule. He'd promised me he had something big planned – I would find out in another half hour.

As always, the dance was geared towards couples. Every other song was slow, and those without dates were left to awkwardly stand against the wall. I did the math – if each song was three minutes, I had about ten to get through before I could leave.

Sometimes watching the couples dance wasn't the worst thing in the world – at least, it was remotely entertaining for the first few songs.

Grover's friend – the one who'd been abducted – was dancing with a blonde girl. They both looked equally awkward. Grover himself was dancing with one of the girls from jazz choir.

Luke and Silena were dancing together, even though I assumed they hadn't come together based on the fact that they didn't match and her wrist was lacking a corsage. I thought they'd broken up – at least, that's what Thalia had told me.

Speaking of Thalia, she had just showed up with…Chris Rodriguez? Three days ago, she'd told me she wasn't even coming to the dance. Now here she was with the star of the basketball team. I wondered if he knew she was pregnant.

Luke noticed Thalia the second she entered. It could have been my imagination, but it seemed like he danced just a bit closer to Silena after that. Between the way she was dancing and how skintight her dress was, I was just waiting for a seam to bust.

Another slow song started. I sensed drama coming when Chris pulled Thalia close.

Across the gym, Silena had her tongue down Luke's throat.

I looked back to Chris and Thalia. They were kissing, too.

What the fuck was going on? It didn't seem right, especially given the fact that she was pregnant. She was even starting to show. The dress did a good job hiding it, but once you knew it was, well, obvious.

Things really heated up when Luke stormed across the gym, leaving Silena completely dazed and confused. I couldn't hear what was being said when he broke Thalia and Chris apart, but let's just say he probably wasn't using happy words.

The fight hardly lasted a minute, and it ended with Thalia and Chris leaving. No one else seemed to notice – everyone was too caught up in their own personal love story tonight to care about anyone else's.

Speaking of personal love stories, it was about time to ditch the dance. Cyrus had told me to meet him in the music room, and I didn't want to be late.

I didn't know what to expect, but I guess I hoped he would have at least done something.

Flipping the lights on, I saw the music room just as it looked every other day. It was kind of eerie being in there all alone though. When Cyrus came through the door, I jumped.

"Relax. It's just me," he said, pulling a bottle of champagne out of a generic grocery bag. "You don't mind drinking, do you?"

I shook my head as Cyrus pulled champagne glasses out of the bag. It wasn't like I'd never gotten drunk before. "I'm supposed to go back at 12:30 to help clean up, but the other chaperones think I'm out buying cleaning supplies," he told me, handing me a glass of champagne.

"How'd you get stuck chaperoning, anyway?"

Cyrus shrugged, taking a drink. "It's a seniority thing, and I'm sitting pretty low on the totem pole right now." It was only his second year of teaching at Shallow Lake. "You know, it's been six weeks since I first kissed you."

"That doesn't count. You were drunk."

"Hung over," he corrected.

I tried not to roll my eyes. "So what are we doing tonight?"

"I'm glad you asked." Cyrus set his glass of champagne aside and pulled an iPod out of his pocket. He hit a button and a slow song began playing. "May I have this dance?" he asked.

"Of course," I said, letting him take my hand. I couldn't help but think how perfect it was – everyone else was in the gym, and here I was with my boyfriend. Okay, maybe the champagne was going to my head. I had drunk that one glass pretty fast.

Maybe that's why I didn't say anything when he started kissing my neck and slid one of my straps off my shoulder. "I love you, Bianca," he whispered in my ear.

At that moment, my phone began vibrating. A gut feeling told me I should answer it, but it was hard to focus with Cyrus expertly unlacing the back of my dress. "Just ignore it," I told Cyrus.

He grinned as he slid my dress off. "There's just me and you right now."

"You and me," I agreed.

I'm not going to give you all the details about how I lost my virginity to my high school music teacher. After all, some things are best kept personal. All I'll tell you is it really was that magic moment – the cliché one you always see in movies.

Maybe if I hadn't been so drunk at the time, I wouldn't have thought so.

* * *

Grover had set me up with Annabeth. The only problem was that she didn't seem to realize that.

We arrived at the dance around nine. Mom had given me money to pay for the three of us. However, Grover disappeared as soon as we entered the gym.

I'd been to middle school dances before – the hippie boarding school I'd gone to had practically had them every other week. However, this was the first time I'd actually had a date. This was the first time I'd have to dance to the awkward slow songs.

Annabeth seemed to feel just as out of place as I did. As soon as the first few notes of _Fall For You _started playing, she looked at me. "Are we…you know…?"

"I guess we should dance together," I agreed.

It was awkward the first few dances, and neither of us said much. "How are you holding up?" Annabeth finally asked me.

I realized she was talking about Mrs. M. After all, that was the reason she'd given for wanting me to go to the dance. "I'm fine," I told her. "What about you?"

"My feet are killing me," she confessed. "I'm going to go stash my shoes in my locker. Want to go get us punch or something?"

I decided that she could have used the opportunity to ditch me, but she hadn't. That had to count for something. "Yeah, sure."

As soon as Annabeth left, Grover appeared out of nowhere. "How's it going?" he asked me.

"Fine, I guess. Where have you been?"

"Dancing with a couple girls from jazz choir. And you guess?"

"I don't know. It's awkward," I admitted.

"You like her, don't you?" Grover asked.

"I…yeah, I guess so."

"Then tell her."

Grover disappeared right before Annabeth returned. Without her heels, I was a few inches taller than her. I guess it made the slow dancing feel slightly more _normal_, but Grover's words kept ringing in my head.

"I, um, Annabeth, can I tell you something?"

"Yeah, sure," she said.

"I think, you know, I like you." Unfortunately, right as I spit out the second half of my sentence, the music switched from slow to a pounding rap song.

"What?" she shouted. I could hardly hear her, even though she was right next to me.

"Never mind," I shouted back. I doubted I'd have the nerve to tell her twice in one night.

* * *

Even though Luke hadn't been willing to go to the Valentine's Day Dance with me as my date, he sure didn't mind dancing with me once we were both there.

I tried not to think about how it was probably just because he wanted to make Thalia jealous. Speaking of Thalia, she'd shown up with Chris Rodriguez – Luke's former best friend. I'd known Clarisse had turned him down when he asked her, but it seemed like a low blow to bring Thalia.

It became harder to fight the suspicion that he was just using me when he kissed me. I looked over my shoulder and saw Chris and Thalia were doing the exact thing. Clarisse would love to hear about that tomorrow.

Once he abruptly dumped me to go talk to Thalia, there was no doubt about it.

And as much as I knew I should have been mad at him, I was just jealous of her. Of the way she captured his attention without trying, of the way she could have him if she really wanted.

Chris and Thalia left, but Luke came back to me. He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me close for another slow dance. The expression on his face clearly said he didn't want to talk about it.

"What was that all about?" I asked.

"She's a bitch," he said flatly. I wished he actually thought that.

After about half an hour, I felt his phone vibrate against my leg. "Don't answer it," I told him.

He ignored me and answered it without bothering to check who it was. "Chris?" he asked. "No, I…what? You're fucking kidding me."

"What's going on?" I asked.

Luke pretended not to hear me. "Yeah, okay. But listen, Chris…you have to make sure the doctor knows she's pregnant."

"What the hell is going on, Luke?" I demanded as he hung up and slid his phone into his pocket. "Were you just talking about Thalia?"

"I have to go," he said. It was the only explanation he gave before brushing past me, practically running out of the gym.

God, I hated Luke.

But at the same time, I was pretty sure I loved him.


End file.
